built a full-stack AI resume builder with React, Node.js and MongoDB

Nikhil Pillai — Thu, 12 Mar 2026 13:39:36 +0000

I built an AI-powered resume builder with React, Node.js and MongoDB
While applying for jobs, I noticed that many resume builders either have limited customization, slow previews, or generate PDFs that don’t match what users see on screen.
I wanted to build a tool that solves those problems while also allowing users to import an existing resume and edit it quickly.
So I built ResumeBaker, a full-stack resume builder with AI-assisted resume import and clean PDF export.

What ResumeBaker does

ResumeBaker allows users to:

• Import an existing resume PDF
• Convert it into structured editable sections using AI
• Edit the resume with a live preview
• Switch between multiple resume layouts
• Export a clean multi-page PDF

The goal was to make resume editing fast and predictable without formatting issues.

Tech stack

The application uses a MERN-style architecture:

Frontend :
• React
• Vite
• React Router

Backend :
• Node.js
• Express

Database :
• MongoDB

AI + Parsing :
• OpenAI API
• pdfjs for extracting resume text

PDF generation :
• React-PDF
• jsPDF
• html2canvas

Key engineering challenges

1. Parsing unstructured resumes

Resumes often contain inconsistent formatting. I implemented a normalization pipeline that converts extracted text into structured sections like:

experience

education

projects

skills

Unknown sections are stored as custom sections so information isn’t lost.

2. Keeping preview and PDF layouts consistent

The application uses two rendering flows:

• HTML-based preview for real-time editing
• React-PDF components for final export

This allows users to edit quickly while still producing structured multi-page PDFs.

3. Managing complex form state

Resume sections can be added, hidden, or reordered. The builder synchronizes structured form data with the preview layouts while avoiding unnecessary re-renders.

Features

• Real-time resume editing with live preview
• AI resume import from uploaded PDFs
• Multiple resume layouts
• Clean multi-page PDF export
• Guest and authenticated user flows

Links
Live demo
https://resume-baker.netlify.app

GitHub repository
https://github.com/TechSwimmer/cv-Builder

Feedback welcome

If you try the project, I would love feedback on:

• resume parsing accuracy
• preview performance
• PDF export UX

I'm actively improving the project.

Live demo
https://resume-baker.netlify.app

GitHub repository
https://github.com/TechSwimmer/cv-Builder

Feedback welcome

If you try the project, I would love feedback on:

• resume parsing accuracy
• preview performance
• PDF export UX

I'm actively improving the project.

DEV Community: Nikhil Pillai

built a full-stack AI resume builder with React, Node.js and MongoDB