Nearly half of job seekers are editing their résumés and LinkedIn profiles to appear younger, according to a new survey, as fears of age discrimination in hiring intensify. The practice, sometimes called «résumé Botox,» involves removing or altering graduation years, early career roles, senior job titles, and even profile photos to obscure an applicant's true age.
The survey, conducted by the AI platform Use.AI, polled 4,263 users who had applied for a job in the past 12 months. More than four in ten respondents, or 42%, said they had removed or changed details on their résumés or LinkedIn profiles to seem younger or less senior. The findings suggest that age-related anxiety is shaping how a significant share of the workforce presents itself to employers.
Women reported making these changes more often than men. Among women aged 45 and older, 53% said they had altered their résumé to appear younger, compared with 35% of men in the same age range. The disparity points to heightened pressure on older women in the job market, where appearance and perceived energy can weigh heavily in hiring decisions.
Fear of ageism was the primary motivation. Of those who had changed their résumés to appear younger, 56% said they believed human recruiters would filter out their applications, while 38% said they thought AI screeners would do the same. The concern reflects a hiring landscape in which automated systems increasingly review applications before a person ever sees them.
Amid those anxieties, nearly three-quarters of respondents who made changes, or 72%, said they used AI to help edit their materials. The survey's authors noted that because all respondents were users of the Use.AI platform, their rates of AI adoption may be higher than in the broader population.
Many job seekers said the strategy worked. Among those who had attempted to appear younger, 43% reported receiving more interviews after editing their résumés or LinkedIn profiles, compared with just 10% who said they received fewer. The results suggest that for some applicants, downplaying age and seniority can open doors that might otherwise remain closed.
Those fears are not unfounded. A separate survey by AARP found that two-thirds of workers aged 50 and older have seen or experienced ageism in the workplace, and 91% of those workers believe age discrimination against older workers is common. Within that group, 36% said they believe it is very common. Nearly a quarter, or 22%, reported feeling they are being pushed out of their jobs because of their age.
Age discrimination often takes subtle forms. Many over-50 workers reported being assumed to be less tech-savvy than younger colleagues, at 33%, being seen as resistant to change, at 24%, having their accomplishments and expertise ignored, at 20%, being the butt of jokes about generational differences, at 21%, and being passed over for training in favor of younger employees, at 20%.
Carly Roszkowski, vice president of financial resilience programming at AARP, said the survey results are relevant to all workers because ageism is «the one discrimination that we all will go through.» She added that society is «obsessed with youth» and called for breaking down barriers and stereotypes across all generations.
The findings come as employers increasingly rely on AI tools to screen applicants, a practice that can inadvertently encode age bias if the systems are trained on data reflecting past hiring patterns. For older workers, the result is a job search that can feel like a contest against both human prejudice and algorithmic filtering.
For now, résumé Botox remains a quiet but widespread tactic. It reflects a labor market in which experience and seniority, once considered assets, are sometimes treated as liabilities. Whether the practice helps individual job seekers or simply masks a deeper problem in hiring culture remains an open question.