Prepare a Complete Job Application With Free Browser Tools

A complete job application can be put together in your browser without signing up anywhere: build the resume, write and trim the cover letter, combine everything into one PDF small enough for the portal, add a clean photo and email signature, and convert the interview time into your own time zone. Your documents and photos are processed on your device, not uploaded.

The example: Maya, a data analyst in Madrid, is applying to a company in Toronto. The application portal asks for a resume, a cover letter of at most 350 words, and a degree certificate, all as one PDF under 2 MB.

Step 1: Build a resume the portal can read

Start in the Resume Builder. What matters here is how the PDF is made. Download PDF produces a file with real, selectable text, which is what an applicant tracking system needs. Its built-in fonts cover Latin alphabets only. If your name or a former employer is written in another script, such as Cyrillic or Arabic, use Print / Save as PDF instead, which goes through your browser's print engine and supports every language.

Keep that download as your master copy; every later step makes a new file.

Step 2: Write the cover letter to length

Draft the letter wherever you're comfortable, then paste it into the word counter. Maya's first draft is 512 words against a 350-word limit. Instead of trimming every paragraph, she cuts the one that repeats her resume. The character count matters too, since some portals cap characters rather than words.

The same text in the reading time calculator tells you how long a recruiter will spend on it: 350 words at the 238-words-per-minute average is about a minute and a half. The first two sentences do most of the work.

Step 3: Turn the letter into a PDF

If you wrote the cover letter in Word, the Word to PDF converter turns the .docx into a PDF with selectable text, on A4 or US Letter. It keeps the structure but not the exact styling: your Word fonts, colours, headers and footers aren't reproduced, so keep a letterhead in the body text. The PDF font covers Latin, Greek and Cyrillic; for other scripts, use Print / Save as PDF, which uses your system fonts. Pick the same paper size as your resume so the pages line up in the final file.

Step 4: Combine everything into one file

Open Merge PDF and add the three files: cover letter, resume, degree certificate. Use the arrow buttons to put them in that order, because a recruiter reads from the top, then click Merge PDFs.

Maya's merged file is 5.8 MB, almost all of it the scanned certificate.

Step 5: Get under the size limit without breaking the text

This is where many applications go wrong. Compress PDF has two modes, and they do very different things to a resume:

• Lossless rewrites the file structure and keeps the text selectable. Always try it first.
• Strong turns every page into a JPG image. It shrinks scans dramatically, but the text can no longer be selected or searched, which means an applicant tracking system can't read your resume.

So don't run Strong mode on the merged file. Compress the scanned certificate on its own with Strong mode, then merge again with the untouched cover letter and resume. The scan gets small, the text pages stay machine-readable, and the final file fits the limit.

Step 6: Add a photo where one is expected

Many LinkedIn profiles and some company portals show a round profile picture. The Profile Picture Maker crops a photo into a circle, rounded square or square, and exports a PNG at 400, 800 or 1024 pixels. A plain border or none looks more professional than a bright gradient ring.

If a form asks for an ID-style photo with fixed dimensions, which some public-sector and visa-linked applications do, use the Passport Photo Maker instead. It crops to sizes such as 35 × 45 mm at 300 DPI. It doesn't edit the background, so take the photo against a plain, light wall.

Step 7: Send it from a professional-looking email

The email signature generator builds a signature with your name, title, phone and links, ready to copy into Gmail, Outlook or Apple Mail. For a job search, the Compact (text only) template is a safe choice. Photos in the other templates load from a public URL you supply, and some company mail filters block remote images. Use the same name and headline as on your resume.

Step 8: Get interview times right across time zones

The recruiter offers a first call on Tuesday 27 October 2026 at 10:00 Toronto time, with a second interviewer in Singapore. In the time zone converter, that becomes 15:00 in Madrid and 22:00 in Singapore. Normally Madrid is six hours ahead of Toronto, but Europe leaves summer time on 25 October and Canada not until 1 November, so that week the gap is only five. Getting this wrong means showing up an hour late.

Once the call is booked, keep Toronto next to Madrid in the world clock so you can check it's a sensible hour before you reply to the recruiter.

Administrative roles often include a typing test. Take a few one-minute runs on the typing speed test in Sentences mode so the real one holds no surprises.

Common mistakes

• Compressing the resume with Strong mode. The file shrinks, but the text becomes a picture no system can parse.
• Mixing A4 and Letter pages in one merged file.
• Trusting time zone abbreviations in the invitation instead of converting by city.
• Uploading a scan of your resume. Always submit the text-based PDF.

FAQ

Should I merge everything or upload separate files?

Follow the portal. If it has separate upload fields, use them. Merge only when it asks for one file.

Will merging change my resume's formatting?

No. Merging copies pages as they are. Only Strong compression re-renders pages.

Are my documents uploaded anywhere?

No. These tools work on the files in your browser, which matters for certificates and anything with personal details.

Find more document tools in the PDF tools collection.