Hobbies and Interests on a Resume: Examples and When to Include Them
By the ResumeInk Team · 13 October 2026
A line of hobbies can start an easy interview conversation, or take up space a recruiter skims past. The difference is whether it tells them something useful. This guide covers when to put hobbies and interests on a resume and when to leave them off, how to turn a vague list into specific lines, examples matched to different jobs, where the section goes and how long it should be, and how the habit differs between India, the UK, the US and Australia.
Should you put hobbies on a resume?
Usually it's optional. An interests section is rarely the reason someone gets hired, but a good one can tip a close decision, give an interviewer an easy first question, or show a quality your work history doesn't. A weak one costs you a line or two and makes you look like everyone else.
A quick test: would a hiring manager learn something from this line that they can't learn anywhere else on the page? "Reading, music, travelling" fails. "Captain of a weekend cricket team; organise fixtures for 14 players" passes, because it shows leadership and organisation without you having to claim either.
Include them when your resume is short on experience, when an interest relates directly to the job, or when it shows a quality the job asks for, such as teamwork, discipline or creativity.
Consider them when the employer is small, talks openly about its culture, or asks about life outside work in the job ad.
Leave them off when space is tight on a senior two-page resume, when the only hobbies you can list are generic, or when the section would push something stronger onto a second page.
Hobbies, interests and activities: what goes where
These words get used loosely, but separating them helps you put each item where it earns the most.
Hobbies are things you do: running, baking, building side projects, playing the tabla.
Interests are subjects you follow or study: behavioural economics, urban design, space exploration. On their own they are weaker, because anyone can claim an interest. Pair them with evidence: "Behavioural economics: write a monthly newsletter summarising new research for 600 subscribers."
Activities with responsibility, such as club secretary, team captain, fest organiser or volunteer coordinator, are closer to experience than to hobbies. Give them a section with bullets, such as Volunteering or Positions of Responsibility. Our guide to volunteer experience on a resume shows the format.
Wins and rankings, such as a state-level chess title, a marathon personal best or a photography award, can go under Awards or Achievements instead. See achievements on a resume.
A simple rule: if it involved responsibility or produced a result, move it up into a section with bullets. Whatever is left becomes your interests line.
How to write hobbies: specific beats generic
The formula is the hobby plus one concrete detail: a level, a frequency, a result or a role. Some rewrites:
Weak: "Reading." Stronger: "Reading Indian and Latin American fiction; run a 12-member monthly book club."
Weak: "Travelling." Stronger: "Himalayan trekking: plan routes, permits and budgets for group treks of six to eight people."
Weak: "Music." Stronger: "Carnatic violin, 10 years of training; perform at college cultural fests."
Weak: "Sports." Stronger: "Half-marathon runner: four races completed, personal best 1:52."
Weak: "Cooking." Stronger: "Sourdough baking; sell loaves at a monthly neighbourhood market."
Weak: "Gaming." Stronger: "Strategy games; built and published two game mods with 5,000 downloads between them."
Weak: "Photography." Stronger: "Bird photography; three images chosen for a city nature trust's annual calendar."
Run two checks before you keep a line. First, could you talk about it with real enthusiasm for two minutes if an interviewer asked? If you list reading, expect "What are you reading at the moment?" Second, is it true today? A hobby you dropped five years ago is an awkward conversation to walk into.
Hobbies that support the job: examples by field
The strongest interests overlap with the work without looking as if they were invented for the application. Some examples by field:
Software and IT: open-source contributions, hackathons, a home server or Raspberry Pi automation project, competitive programming. On a software engineer resume, anything substantial belongs under Projects, with a link.
Data and analytics: Kaggle competitions, a cricket or football statistics blog, a personal budget tracker you built in Python.
Marketing and content: a food or travel blog with real readers, a YouTube channel, editing a society magazine.
Sales and customer-facing roles: debating, Toastmasters, team sports, organising community events.
Teaching and training: coaching a junior sports team, tutoring, running a weekend coding club. A teacher resume can use these as evidence of working with young people.
Design: sketching, lettering, photography, making things by hand. A portfolio link does more than any description.
Engineering: robotics, drone building, model making, restoring motorcycles.
Healthcare: first-aid volunteering, endurance sport, anything that shows stamina and calm under pressure.
Don't stretch a hobby to fit. "Chess (develops strategic thinking)" reads as forced. Let the detail make the point for you: "Chess: rated 1,700 on an online platform; coach two beginners at a local club."
Where the section goes and how long it should be
Hobbies and interests go at the end of the resume, after experience, education and any certifications. Keep the section to one or two lines, or three or four short bullets at most. A plain heading such as "Interests" or "Hobbies and interests" helps both readers and parsing software recognise it.
Two formats work. A single line, when space is tight:
Interests: trail running (two ultramarathons); urban sketching; volunteer reading partner at a primary school
Or short bullets, when you have room and each item has a detail worth giving:
Football: goalkeeper and treasurer for a Sunday league club
Podcasting: co-host a fortnightly show on Indian startups (40 episodes so far)
Urdu poetry: translate ghazals into English for a personal blog
How the section is treated depends on where you apply:
UK: "Interests" is a familiar, optional part of a CV, especially for graduates, and interviewers sometimes ask about it. See the UK CV format.
US and Canada: less common on experienced resumes. Include it when it's relevant or you have room on one page; otherwise it's the first thing to cut. The US resume format guide covers what usually stays off.
India: fresher resumes and biodata often list hobbies near the personal details, and interviewers do ask about them, so make each one specific.
Australia: optional, short and at the end. One line is plenty.
Hobbies to leave off, or word with care
Some lines do more harm than good:
Passive or generic pastimes: watching films, surfing the internet, listening to music, socialising. Nearly everyone does them, so they tell the reader nothing.
Anything that reveals what you'd rather not be judged on: religious, political and some community activities can tell an employer about your beliefs, health or background. That's your decision. If the work itself was valuable, such as running a food drive through a place of worship, you can describe the work and choose how much to say about the organisation.
Things that clash with the job: betting, or a hobby that suggests your evenings and weekends are fully booked when the role needs flexible hours.
Exaggerations: "fluent in French" after one term of classes, or "avid reader" with no recent book to name. Interviewers enjoy testing these.
Long lists: eight interests look padded. Pick your best three.
Does a hobbies section affect applicant tracking systems? Parsing software reads it like any other text, so it won't break anything as long as it's real text under a clear heading. It rarely adds useful keywords, though, so don't stuff job terms into your interests. Keywords belong in your summary, skills and experience, as our guide to resume keywords for ATS screening explains.
Hobbies on a fresher or first-job resume
When you have little work history, your interests carry more weight, because they are one of the few places a recruiter can see initiative. That makes it more important to be specific, not less.
A typical line from an Indian fresher resume, and a better version:
Weak: "Hobbies: Reading books, playing cricket, listening to music, internet surfing."
Stronger: "Interests: cricket (college team, inter-university tournament 2025); building Android apps (two published on the Play Store); stand-up comedy (perform at open mics in Hindi and English)."
Now look at the stronger version again. The Android apps deserve a Projects entry with a link and a line on what they do. The college cricket team might fit under Achievements. Once those move, the interests line gets shorter and the resume as a whole gets stronger. Our guides to a first job resume and the resume format for freshers show how all these sections fit on one page.
Adding an Interests section in ResumeInk
ResumeInk has no standard hobbies section, so you add one as a custom section:
Upload your current resume as a PDF, Word file or photo (up to 20 MB), or start from a sample. The AI rebuilds it in a designed template, and a Hobbies or Interests section it finds keeps its own heading.
Choose Add section and pick Interests, or a blank custom section with a heading of your own, such as "Hobbies and interests".
Click any text to edit it, and move the section to the end of the page.
Hide it for a senior application without deleting it, then show it again for a graduate scheme.
Check the ATS score, switch among 260 designs without retyping, and download a clean PDF.
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Only if they add something: a quality the job needs, a result, or a detail that sets you apart. On a short or entry-level resume they often help; on a full two-page senior resume they are usually the first thing to cut.
What are good hobbies to put on a resume?
Ones you can describe specifically and talk about in an interview, ideally linked to the job: team sports with a role, coaching or tutoring, a blog or channel with real readers, open-source or maker projects, endurance events. The detail matters more than which hobby it is.
Is reading a good hobby to put on a resume?
Only with a detail that makes it yours, such as the kind of books you read or a book club you run. On its own it is too common to tell an employer anything, and interviewers may ask what you are reading now.
Should a fresher resume in India include hobbies?
Many do, and interviewers often ask about them. Keep it to one line of two or three specific interests, and move anything with a result, such as a project or a competition win, into its own section.
Do hobbies affect how an ATS reads my resume?
Not if the section is real text under a clear heading such as Interests. It won't hurt parsing, but it rarely adds useful keywords, so don't use it to pad your resume with job terms.