# Getting Started

> How Resume Matcher works: start from a master resume, add a job description, review the tailored version, then refine it in the builder and export a PDF.
- **Section**: Introduction
- **URL**: https://resumematcher.fyi/docs/getting-started/

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## Overview

New here? Read [What is Resume Matcher?](/docs/what-is-resume-matcher/) for what it is, who it's for and how it keeps your data local. This page walks through the workflow.

Start from a master resume, add a job description, review the tailored version, then refine everything in the builder before you export.

It supports the full application workflow:

- Upload or build a master resume, or up to five, one per career track
- Tailor a master resume for a specific job description, and review every change before it's saved
- Review JD Match with highlighted keywords and a match percentage
- Edit content in the Resume Builder
- Generate cover letters, outreach messages and interview prep from the same job context
- Export polished PDFs
- Track each application on a Kanban board

## Typical Workflow

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1. **Connect an AI model** in Settings: a cloud provider with your own API key, a local model, or your ChatGPT or Claude plan. See [Bring Your Own AI Key](/docs/bring-your-own-ai-key/).
2. **Add a master resume** with your full work history, projects, skills, and education: upload a PDF or Word file, or build one with the Resume Wizard. You can keep up to five masters, for example one per career track, and mark one as the default. To fill out thin entries, open a master's page and click **Enhance Resume**.
3. **Paste a job description** on the Tailor page, which the dashboard's **Create Resume** tile opens. If you have more than one master, pick the one to tailor from under **Select Resume**; the default is preselected. To tailor for several jobs in one go, add them to the **Tailoring Queue** instead; queued jobs are saved without the review step.
4. **Choose a tailoring intensity** with `Light nudge`, `Keyword enhance` (the default), or `Full tailor`, set the **Page limit** and **Bullets per role**, then click **Generate Tailored Resume**.
5. **Review the changes** in a before-and-after preview, with high-risk changes flagged, then choose **Confirm & Save** or **Reject & Regenerate**. The app keeps the most relevant bullets within your bullets per role and, by rendering the page, trims the rest to fit your page limit (2 pages by default). Your master keeps every bullet.
6. **Edit in the builder** using templates, formatting controls, custom sections and AI Regenerate. On a tailored resume, the **JD Match** tab shows the match percentage and highlights the job's keywords in your resume.
7. **Generate supporting materials** such as cover letters, outreach messages and interview prep.
8. **Export to PDF** when the resume is ready to send.
9. **Track the application.** Each tailored resume you confirm gets a card in the **Applied** column of the application tracker.

## AI Providers and Privacy

Resume Matcher supports these providers:

- OpenAI
- Anthropic
- OpenRouter
- Google Gemini
- DeepSeek
- Groq
- Azure AI Foundry
- Ollama
- Any OpenAI-compatible server (llama.cpp, vLLM, LM Studio)

See [Bring Your Own AI Key](/docs/bring-your-own-ai-key/) for setup.

You can use cloud models or keep everything local with Ollama. The Ollama path is the privacy-first option when you want resume data to stay on your machine.

## Language Support

Resume Matcher supports both multilingual UI and multilingual generated content, including:

- English
- Spanish
- Chinese (Simplified)
- Japanese
- Portuguese (Brazilian)
- French
- Korean

The UI language and the content language (the language the AI writes in) are set separately in Settings.

## Run It Locally or with Docker

- [Installation](/docs/installation/) for local development with Python, Node.js, `uv`, and `npm`
- [Docker Installation](/docs/docker-installation/) for the default containerized setup
- [Docker + Ollama](/docs/docker-ollama/) for private local-model usage with Docker

## Next Steps

- [Features](/docs/features/) for the full product surface
- [PDF Templates](/docs/pdf-templates/) for layout and formatting controls