Skip to content

Getting Started — Your First CV in 10 Minutes

Step 1: Initialize the Project

On your local system, create the project with this command:

typst init @preview/brilliant-cv

To use a specific release, add its version number. All releases after 2.0.0 are supported:

typst init @preview/brilliant-cv:4.1.0

Step 2: Install Fonts

Install these fonts. Typst needs them to render the CV correctly:

For Typst Web, upload the three Font Awesome OTF files to your project. For local compilation, install the same files on your operating system. If these fonts are absent, the contact icons render as boxes.

Step 3: File Structure Map

After this step, your project contains these files:

File / Directory Purpose
cv.typ Entry point. Edit it to add or remove modules.
letter.typ Cover letter entry point
profile_en/metadata.toml Complete configuration for the English profile
profile_en/*.typ Your English content modules. Edit these files.
profile_<name>/... Other profile variants (fr, de, it, and zh are examples)
assets/ Your profile photo and logos

Tip

Do not edit the package source files under @preview/brilliant-cv. The Typst package manager controls these files.

Keep personal files out of public repositories

Many people keep their completed CV project in a public git repository (see Step 8). The assets/ directory then holds a real profile photo. If you use letter.typ, it also holds a scanned signature. Both files are sensitive. Use a private repository, or add the real files to .gitignore and commit placeholders.

Step 4: Configure profile_en/metadata.toml

You set all options for the English profile in profile_en/metadata.toml. This file is a complete, self-contained CV configuration. The Configuration Reference lists every field.

Set these fields first:

  • awesome_color — your accent color ("skyblue", "red", "nephritis", "concrete", "darknight")
  • first_name / last_name — your name in the header
  • [personal.info] — your contact details (email, phone, GitHub, LinkedIn, and more)
  • header_quote — the italic line below your name
  • cv_footer / letter_footer — the text in the footer

Step 5: Add Your First Entry

Open profile_en/education.typ. Replace its content with this code:

#import "@preview/brilliant-cv:4.1.0": cv-section, cv-entry

#cv-section("Education")

#cv-entry(
  title: [Master of Data Science],
  society: [University of California],
  date: [2018 - 2020],
  location: [USA],
  description: list(
    [Thesis: Predicting Customer Churn using ML],
  ),
)

Each profile module file imports from @preview/brilliant-cv and makes cv-* calls. The profile contains these modules: education.typ, professional.typ, projects.typ, certificates.typ, publications.typ, and skills.typ. cv.typ includes them in that order.

To add a new section, create a new module file under profile_en/. Then add its name to the import-modules((...)) call in cv.typ.

Step 6: Compile

typst compile cv.typ

Step 7: (Optional) Add More Profiles

If you keep CVs in more than one language, or for different target roles, copy profile_en/ to profile_<name>/. Then edit the fields that are different. Each profile is independent, and there is no shared root configuration. For more information, see Recipes → Adding a New Profile.

Step 8: Go Beyond

These steps are optional:

  1. Use git to manage your project. You can then track changes and tag releases of your CV (git tag cv-v1, git tag cv-v2).
  2. Use typstyle and pre-commit to keep the format of your .typ files consistent.
  3. If your CV is in English, use typos to find spelling mistakes.
  4. Configure CI to compile your CV on each push. See Recipes → CI/CD with GitHub Actions.

中文快速上手 (Chinese quickstart)

The template contains profile_zh/ as an example. Copy that directory, or copy profile_en/ to profile_zh/ and edit metadata.toml. v4 has no automatic "language" mode. You set the fonts, the name layout, the section style, and the width of the date column explicitly:

[personal]
display_name = "王道尔"        # overrides the Latin first/last name split

[layout]
date_width = "4.7cm"          # wider column fits Chinese month/year strings

[layout.fonts]
regular_fonts = ["Source Sans 3", "Heiti SC"]  # Latin + CJK fallback chain
header_font = "Heiti SC"

[layout.section]
title_highlight = "full"      # whole title in accent color, not split by codepoint

Tip

Heiti SC is available only on macOS. On other systems, and on typst.app, Typst falls back to a different font and the result looks different. For other systems, or for typst.app, use "Noto Sans CJK SC" in the two font fields. Install that font locally, or upload it to your typst.app project.

Compile the CV with the profile input:

typst compile cv.typ --input profile=zh

If the characters render as boxes, see Troubleshooting → Non-Latin Characters.