Junior Backend Developer Resume Example

Overview

Backend developer roles at the junior level require evidence that you can build APIs, work with databases, and deploy services to production. The competition is stiff, and many applicants have similar degrees. What sets candidates apart is showing systems that are actually running, not just code that compiles locally.

This resume belongs to Toby Griffiths, a Computer Science graduate from the University of Bristol. He completed a summer internship at Funding Circle, contributed to 2 open source projects, and deployed a side project API that serves 1,200 requests per day. His resume works because every technical claim is supported by a deployment, a metric, or a contribution link.

What Makes This Resume Work

The Funding Circle internship demonstrates fintech experience. Working at a public fintech company and contributing to their loan origination API gives Toby industry-specific experience that many graduates lack. He names the endpoints he built, the testing coverage he achieved, and the code review process he followed.

Deployed projects replace theoretical claims. A side project API serving 1,200 requests per day on a Hetzner VPS proves Toby can set up servers, configure databases, and keep a service running. This is vastly more convincing than listing "Python" as a skill.

Open source contributions are verifiable. Two merged PRs in well-known projects (one with 3,400 stars) give hiring managers something they can check. The contributions are described in terms of what they fixed and how many users were affected.

Database skills go beyond "I know SQL." Toby describes schema design decisions, migration strategies, and query optimisation results. Reducing a report query from 8 seconds to 400ms tells a much better story than "Proficient in PostgreSQL."

Key Takeaways

Junior backend developer resumes should lead with deployed services and their metrics (requests per day, response times, uptime). Name the frameworks, databases, and cloud providers you use. Open source contributions with merged PRs are powerful evidence of code quality. An internship or placement at a tech company is the single best credential at this level. Describe your API work in terms of endpoints, consumers, and performance, not just "built APIs."