Application photo in Germany: yes or no? Tips for your CV

Hardly any question about applying in Germany, Austria and Switzerland comes up as often as the one about the photo. The short answer: you do not have to send one, and many applicants do anyway. This guide helps you decide and shows what a good application photo looks like.

In short: The photo is voluntary. If you use one, make it a current, professional portrait with a neutral background, top right on the CV. If not, the CV is still complete and tidy.

What applies in Germany

An application photo is not mandatory. The General Equal Treatment Act (AGG) is meant to prevent people from being disadvantaged because of personal characteristics; a missing photo must therefore not hurt you. It is still usual, especially at traditional employers. In international teams, at startups and in online forms many applicants leave it out, and some companies explicitly ask for applications without a photo.

This applies largely to Austria and Switzerland too. There the photo on the CV is even more widespread, but also voluntary.

Yes or no? A decision aid

In favour of a photo:

• The industry is traditional or customer-facing, and you apply to a classic employer.
• You apply by post or by email with a full application pack.
• You have a good, current picture and feel comfortable with it.

Against a photo:

• The company asks for anonymised applications or applications without a photo.
• You apply through an online form that has no photo field.
• You have no good, current picture. A bad photo hurts more than no photo ever would.

You decide for each application anew. With FlowResume you show or hide the photo in any template with one click, without the rest of the CV shifting.

What a good application photo looks like

• Crop: head and shoulders, face clearly visible, head not cut off.
• Background: calm and neutral, light or subtle, without patterns and without other people.
• Look and expression: friendly, into the camera, natural. A slight smile looks open.
• Clothing: suited to the industry. When in doubt, one step more formal than the everyday dress at the company.
• Light: even, without hard shadows, ideally daylight or studio light.
• Quality: sharp, high enough resolution, not heavily edited or filtered.
• Age: recent enough that someone recognises you at the interview.

A professional photographer delivers the most reliable result. If you take the picture yourself, set the camera at eye level, use daylight and ask a second person to press the button.

Where the photo goes

On the CV the photo usually sits top right next to your contact details, roughly passport-photo size in portrait format. On a Deckblatt it is larger. The cover letter does not need a photo. Keep the file small: the picture should not weigh more than a few hundred kilobytes, so the whole application goes through by email.

Applying without a photo

Without a photo you are missing nothing essential. Do not leave the area empty; use the layout of a template without photo: the contact details then sit at the top, and the CV stays consistent. What counts then is content, structure and clean design. The guide on the tabular CV shows what that looks like.

Data protection

A photo is personal data. Send it only to companies you really apply to, and do not use services that handle your picture without your consent. With FlowResume your data is stored in the EU, and you can export or delete it at any time. If you have a professional application photo created from selfies, that is an optional feature that needs your explicit consent.

Common mistakes

• Holiday photos, selfies, group pictures or pictures with sunglasses.
• A heavily filtered or edited picture.
• A photo that is ten years old.
• A photo on a CV that otherwise does not fit the job: the picture does not save weak content.

Next steps

Pick a CV template, try it with and without photo and then decide. More on the structure and order of the application pack on the German CV page.