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Two numbers out of 100

ShouldApply vs Rezi: Scoring the Job vs Scoring the Resume

Rezi is one of the better ATS-focused resume builders: a structured editor, an AI writer, keyword targeting against a pasted JD, and the real-time Rezi Score grading your document's content and formatting. Its Lifetime deal at $149 one-time is a standout in a subscription-heavy category.

The distinction that matters: the Rezi Score scores your resume. The ShouldApply score scores the job. A 92 resume score against a ghost listing, or against a role two depth levels above you, still converts to nothing. The two numbers answer different questions, in a specific order: is this job worth it, then is my resume ready for it.

Score a job freeSee both scores side by side

Last updated

The short version

Both hand you a score. They grade different things.

The Rezi Score grades your document. The ShouldApply score grades the opportunity. Confusing them is how a 92 resume ends up aimed at a listing nobody is filling.

Everything on this page about Rezi links to their own pages, with the date we checked it.

Quick Picks: Best By Use Case

100-Point Evaluation Rubric →
Pick Rezi if
Best for Single-Column ATS Resume Building from Scratch
You are building or rewriting the resume itself. The Lifetime plan is the best value in the category.
Pick ShouldApply if
Best for Instant Deterministic Fit + Ghost Job Detection
The resume is fine and the targeting is not, so you need to know which jobs deserve it.

Same shape, different question

A 92 and a 67 about the same application

Both numbers can be true simultaneously, and neither one predicts the other. The order you read them in is what decides whether the evening was worth it.

Rezi score

92/100

How good is this document?

Content, formatting, and keyword coverage against a pasted job description.

A 92 here says nothing about whether the role is still open, whether it wants two levels above you, or whether the band clears your floor.

ShouldApply score

67/100

Is this job worth the hour?

Skill depth on an L1-L5 scale, salary signals, and ghost probability for one listing.

A 67 here is a live opportunity worth tailoring for. Both numbers can be true at once about the same application.

Feature by feature

ShouldApply and Rezi, side by side

Every row is a claim we would defend in writing. Rezi wins the entire document half, and the free tier comparison is not close.

ShouldApplyScore a job free

  • Core function

    ShouldApply

    Job fit scoring (0-100)

    Rezi

    AI resume builder + resume score

  • What the score grades

    ShouldApply

    The job, against your profile

    Rezi

    Your resume document

  • Keyword targeting

    ShouldApply

    Depth-aware (L1–L5), not just terms

    Rezi

    JD term matching (its strength)

  • Ghost job detection

    ShouldApply

    Included. Yes (0-95%)

    Rezi

    Not included. No

  • Salary benchmarks

    ShouldApply

    Included. Yes

    Rezi

    Not included. No

  • Resume building

    ShouldApply

    Tailoring only (Pro)

    Rezi

    Full builder, templates, AI writer

  • Free tier

    ShouldApply

    23 tools, no signup

    Rezi

    1 resume, 3 PDF downloads

  • Pricing

    ShouldApply

    Free + $29.99/mo Pro

    Rezi

    Free + $29/mo Pro or $149 lifetime

Cost

The best-value plan here is not ours

Rezi's $149 one-time Lifetime plan undercuts every subscription in the category within about five months. If your bottleneck is the document, that is the purchase to make.

Monthly, Rezi Pro is $29 against our $29.99. But comparing monthly prices misses the point when one product is a one-time purchase you keep and the other is an ongoing filter you run weekly. Rezi Lifetime plus ShouldApply Pro for a year still costs less than most single premium career tools.

What Pro includes →

What you pay per month

  • ShouldApply Prounlimited scoring$29.99
  • Rezi Proor $149 once, for life$29
Both prices checked 31 August 2026 against each company's own pricing page. Rezi's Lifetime plan has no monthly equivalent, so it is not on the chart; at $149 once it beats every monthly plan here over any long search.

The limit of optimization

Four things a 92 does not survive

Rezi can get the document to the top of its own scale. These are the failure modes that live outside the document entirely.

  • The role was filled in June

    Nothing about your resume changes whether anyone is reading applications. Ghost probability is scored before you tailor.

  • It wants ownership, you have exposure

    Keyword targeting confirms the term is present. It cannot see that the sentence around it implies L4 and your experience reads as L2.

  • The band is 30% below your floor

    Most postings do not state salary. A benchmark by role and location tells you before the third interview, not after.

  • You sent 40 of them this month

    A perfect document applied indiscriminately produces perfect rejections. Selection is the lever the document cannot pull.

Where we are the wrong tool

You probably don't want ShouldApply if

  • You need a resume built from scratch. Rezi's structured editor beats writing into a blank page, and we do not have one.
  • You want real-time feedback while you write bullets.
  • ATS keyword targeting against a pasted JD is exactly what you need. That is Rezi's strongest feature.
  • You already know which jobs you want and just need the document to be excellent.

Using both

Score the job, then polish the resume for it

The gap report doubles as the target list for the rewrite, so the second step gets cheaper as well as better aimed.

  1. ShouldApplyScore the listing before writing anything.
  2. ShouldApplySkip the low scores and the high ghost probability.
  3. ReziOpen Rezi for the survivors and tailor against the gap report.
  4. ReziPush the Rezi Score up on that specific version.
  5. YouSend fewer, sharper applications.

Honest limitations & architectural trade-offs

Where ShouldApply Falls Short

Most comparison pages pretend their product has zero drawbacks. If you are evaluating ShouldApply alongside Rezi, here are the deliberate boundaries where our architecture stops and another tool is the better choice.

We require human review before final Submit (no blind spam auto-applying)

ShouldApply never clicks the final Submit button behind your back. Our approval queue pre-stages tailored resumes and fills ATS fields, then pauses for your explicit human approval before anything is sent. If you want a background bot that fires unreviewed forms without human verification, we will not build it: blind spam scripts trigger Workday/Greenhouse IP shadowbans and submit hallucinated screening answers.

What to use instead: Candidates who want high-speed manual form completion without scoring can use Simplify's free autofill.

We refuse to invent metrics or fabricate skills on your resume

Every tailored bullet in ShouldApply is locked to a verified experience entry in your profile (source_bullet_id provenance). When a job description asks for a quantified metric you have not supplied, we insert an explicit placeholder for you to fill rather than letting a language model invent numbers you cannot defend in a technical screen.

What to use instead: If you want unconstrained creative copywriting from scratch, a general-purpose resume writer like Kickresume is a better fit.

We are not a job board or an employer marketplace

Employers cannot post jobs or buy sponsored placement on ShouldApply. While we aggregate listings from major boards every 2 hours and score any URL you drop in, our pool is smaller than raw global marketplaces.

What to use instead: Use LinkedIn, Indeed, Wellfound, or Otta for top-of-funnel discovery, then score the promising URLs in ShouldApply.

We do not provide 1-on-1 human career coaching or outplacement retainers

ShouldApply is deterministic decision and autofill software. We do not offer live human resume reviews, executive coaching calls, or salary negotiation representation.

What to use instead: For structured coaching and LinkedIn profile makeovers, consider Careerflow or a dedicated career coach.

Published 100-point testing rubric

How We Evaluate Job Search Tools (100-Point Methodology)

Every comparison on ShouldApply is graded against five deterministic engineering and consumer-protection criteria totaling 100 points. All competitor pricing and feature claims link directly to the vendor's own documentation with verification dates.

ShouldApply 100-point evaluation methodology rubric and deterministic testing weights
Evaluation CriterionWeightWhat We MeasureDeterministic Verification Protocol
ATS Autofill Accuracy30% (30 pts)Field completion fidelity across Greenhouse, Lever, Ashby, Workday (data-automation-id), iCIMS (iframe + Country-to-State cascade), and SmartRecruiters (Upload -> Wait -> Diff & Patch on <spl-*> / <oc-*> Shadow DOM).Automated DOM test harness verifying native HTMLInputElement setter dispatch, zero post-parse field clobbering, and human confirmation gating.
Scoring Latency & Cost25% (25 pts)Time-to-first-score and marginal compute cost per evaluated listing before on-demand resume tailoring is requested.Sub-100ms client-side pre-scoring against an 8,490-term deterministic skill taxonomy ($0.00 per impression) paired with SHA-256 profile+JD input hashing.
Ghost Job Detection20% (20 pts)Ability to flag stale, reposted, or low-intent listings before a candidate invests an hour tailoring an application.3-layer dead-link HTTP/body scan, 90-day WARN Act layoff cross-checks, posting age decay curves, and salary band spread (>60%) detection.
Pricing Transparency15% (15 pts)Clarity of published monthly, weekly, and annual rates, free-tier utility without forced card capture, and friction-free cancellation or pause options.Direct audit of each vendor's public pricing URL, checking for cookie/iframe price gating, surprise quarterly billing, and self-serve pause flows.
Privacy & Data Ownership10% (10 pts)Isolation of sensitive candidate disclosures (EEO/disability/veteran status), absence of employer-side ad targeting, and factual resume provenance.Static code and network inspection confirming EEO answers remain in on-device chrome.storage.local and tailored bullets lock to verified source_bullet_id records.
Total Composite Benchmark Score100% (100 pts)Audited across live Greenhouse, Lever, Ashby, Workday, iCIMS, and SmartRecruiters portals.

Straight answers

Questions about ShouldApply and Rezi

Is the Rezi Score the same kind of score as ShouldApply's?

No. Rezi grades your resume's content, format, and keyword optimization. ShouldApply grades a specific job against your profile: skill depth match, salary signals, authenticity. High marks on one say nothing about the other.

Which should I pay for?

Depends on your bottleneck. Getting interviews from the jobs you pick but your resume looks weak: Rezi ($29/month or $149 lifetime). Applying constantly and hearing nothing: that's usually a targeting problem, and ShouldApply Pro is $29.99/month. Rezi's lifetime deal plus ShouldApply Pro together still cost less per year than most single premium tools.

Does ShouldApply build resumes?

It tailors existing resumes on Pro, guided by the gap report for a specific job. It's not a from-scratch builder with templates. If you need the document built, Rezi or Kickresume do that better.

Score the job before you polish the resume.

Free at ShouldApply.

Score a job freeTry 23 tools, no signup