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Aptly is a Candidate Intelligence Platform for recruiters. You upload CVs, Aptly ranks them against your job spec, flags the best candidates, generates a ready-to-send email for every applicant, and produces a shareable shortlist for your client — all in under two minutes.

The three things Aptly solves

• Screening admin — ranked shortlist with evidence-based reasoning in under 2 minutes, no matter how many CVs.
• Client visibility — a live branded shortlist link your hiring manager can view and comment on, in real time.
• Candidate ghosting — every applicant gets a personalised, reasoned response. Nobody is ignored.

Basic workflow

1. Create a job (paste your spec or let AI build one for you)
2. Upload CVs — up to 50 at once, PDF or Word
3. Get a ranked shortlist with scores, reasons, and draft emails
4. Move candidates through the pipeline as the process progresses
5. Share the live shortlist link with your client

Every screening in Aptly lives inside a job. Jobs keep your candidates, pipeline, interview logs, and client share link all in one place.

Option 1 — Use my own spec

Paste your existing job description, give the role a title, optionally link a client, and you're ready to screen. Takes about 20 seconds.

Option 2 — Build with AI

Answer a short questionnaire (role title, seniority, must-haves, optional context) and Aptly writes a complete, professional job spec. It also flags any issues — unrealistic requirements, conflicting criteria, missing information — before you screen a single CV. This produces noticeably better screening accuracy than a rough paste.

One scan = one CV processed against a job spec. If you upload 10 CVs, that costs 10 scans. Scans are used at the point of screening — not when you create a job or view results.

Scan limits by plan

• Free — 50 scans total, 3 active jobs
• Starter — 250 scans/month, 15 active jobs
• Pro — 750 scans/month, 40 active jobs
• Agency — 3,000 scans/month, unlimited jobs

Monthly scans reset on your billing renewal date. You can see your usage and reset date on the Home screen and in My Profile.

Top-up packs

If you need extra scans without upgrading, you can buy a one-time top-up pack from My Profile → Personal tab → Plan & billing. Three sizes are available: 50 scans for $19, 150 scans for $49, or 500 scans for $149. Top-up scans never expire and carry over indefinitely. They are drawn on only after your monthly plan allowance is exhausted.

Open a job and click + Add candidates — this scrolls the page down to the CV drop zone at the bottom of the job. Drop your files in or click to browse. Aptly accepts PDF and Word (.docx / .doc) files.

Limits

• Maximum 50 CVs per screening batch
• CVs are processed in parallel batches of 8, so larger uploads are significantly faster than sequential tools
• A typical 20-CV batch takes 60–90 seconds

Adding more CVs later

You can screen additional CVs into the same job at any time by dropping files into the drop zone at the bottom of the job page. Each new batch is scored against the same job spec and merged into the existing pipeline.

Every hiring manager weighs candidates differently. The What this client values tags tell the scoring engine what to prioritise when two otherwise similar candidates are compared.

Available tags (select up to 2)

• Exact technical match — penalise candidates who lack specific required technologies
• Culture & personality fit — weight soft skills and communication style indicators more heavily
• Sector credibility — prioritise candidates with direct industry or domain experience
• Budget-sensitive hire — favour candidates likely to accept a modest salary range
• Speed over perfection — weight availability and shorter notice periods more heavily
• Leadership & gravitas — look for signals of management presence and stakeholder credibility
• Growth potential — favour candidates with strong trajectory even if slightly underqualified today
• Niche credential required — treat the specific credential or certification as near-mandatory

Every CV you screen is automatically added to your candidate database. AI Database Search compares any candidate's history against a new job spec, so you can pull from people you already have on file before sourcing externally.

1. Open a job and click the DB search button in the job header
2. Aptly searches your full candidate pool and returns ranked matches, each with a brief reason explaining why it fits
3. Click + Add to job to bring a candidate into the job's pipeline. They land in the Applied stage with no score and no verdict.
4. To get a score and verdict, click Screen now on the candidate row. This runs the AI scoring against the current job spec and uses 1 scan credit.

Every candidate receives a score from 0–100 and a verdict. The score reflects overall fit against the job spec. The verdict is a category recommendation:

• Strong shortlist — Recommend progressing. Strong match on the criteria that matter most.
• Borderline — Possible. Meets some criteria but has notable gaps. Two email options are generated — one to progress, one to decline.
• Do not progress — Does not meet the requirements. A respectful rejection email is generated automatically.

Ranking

Candidates are ranked within each verdict category. A rank of #1 means Aptly considers them the strongest overall match — not just the highest raw score.

What factors influence the score?

• Match against must-have skills and experience in the job spec
• Seniority alignment (mismatch is a hard penalty — candidates significantly over or under-levelled score below 50)
• Domain and sector credibility
• Any client values tags you have set

Aptly analyses each CV for signs that it was substantially generated by AI rather than written by the candidate. This does not disqualify anyone automatically — it is a signal for your own judgement.

• None — No meaningful AI writing signals detected
• Mild — Some generic phrasing or structural patterns; could be natural
• Moderate — Notable AI-style characteristics. Worth a closer look at the CV
• Strong — Strong signals of AI generation. The CV may not reflect the candidate's actual writing or depth

A brief reason is shown under each flag when you expand a candidate row. Use this as context when deciding whether to probe further at interview.

Aptly sets a ⭐ Hidden gem flag on candidates who have a unique or standout credential that might not be obvious from their overall score alone. This could be a rare certification, an unusually relevant prior employer, or domain experience that exactly matches the client's niche.

The flag is designed to surface candidates who might otherwise be overlooked in a score-sorted list. When a candidate has this flag, read the reason — it often explains why a mid-range score still represents a strong potential fit for a specific type of client.

Every candidate row expands to show two evidence lists:

• Why they stand out — specific strengths from their CV that match the role requirements. These are direct references to what is in the CV, not generic praise.
• Gaps to probe — specific areas where the candidate falls short or where the CV is ambiguous. These are designed to be used as interview prompts.

These are grounded in the actual CV content — Aptly will not invent qualifications or pad the lists. If a CV is thin, the reasons will be thin too.

Each candidate in a job moves through a pipeline that reflects where they are in the process:

• Applied — Applied via your job board. Not yet screened.
• Screened — CV has been processed by Aptly. Awaiting your decision.
• Shortlisted — You have confirmed they are moving forward.
• Interviewing — Interview scheduled or in progress.
• Offered — Offer has been made.
• Placed — Role filled by this candidate.
• Rejected — Not progressing. Moved to the collapsed rejected section.

Moving a candidate

Click the stage track (the segmented progress bar) on any candidate row to advance them to a new stage. You can also click the Reject button to move them directly to rejected. When you move a candidate to Shortlisted, Interviewing, Offered, or Rejected — a relevant draft email appears automatically for you to review and send.

The Applied stage holds candidates who have entered a job's pipeline but have not yet been scored. Two flows put candidates here:

• Job board applications. Anyone who applies through your public job board lands in Applied as a fresh CV.
• AI Database Search adds. Candidates you bring in from the DB search results land in Applied with no score and no verdict.

Running Screen now

Click ✨ Screen now on any Applied candidate to run the AI scoring against the current job spec. This uses 1 scan credit, generates a score, verdict, match reasons, gaps, and a draft email, and moves the candidate to the Screened stage. From there they progress through the rest of the pipeline as normal.

You can also use ✨ Screen all at the top of the Applied panel to score every unscreened candidate in one go.

The kanban view shows your candidates as cards arranged in columns by stage — a visual alternative to the default list view. Both views show the same candidates and are kept in sync.

Switching to kanban

Open any job with screened candidates and click the ⊞ Kanban toggle button at the top right of the candidates section. Click ≡ List to switch back.

What each card shows

• Candidate name and initials avatar
• Email address (if available)
• Score bar and percentage
• Verdict badge (Strong / Borderline)

Moving a candidate

Click the ⋯ button on any card to open a stage menu and move the candidate to a different column. The change takes effect immediately and updates the list view at the same time.

Opening a candidate

Click anywhere on a card (other than the ⋯ button) to open a full candidate modal. This shows their score, match reasons, gaps, and all draft emails — so you can action a candidate without leaving the kanban view.

When a role is filled, mark the job as Filled using the status dropdown at the top of the job page. A placement modal will appear where you can record:

• Which candidate was placed
• The placement fee and currency

Placed jobs and fees are tracked on your Home dashboard. The placed candidate's stage is automatically updated to Placed.

You can edit placement details at any time by clicking Edit placement details on the job page.

Expand any candidate row and click 📅 Log interview to record an interview. You can capture:

• Interview date
• Format (video, in person, phone, other)
• Outcome (progressing / pending decision / not progressing)
• Notes — key impressions, things to follow up

Interview logs are stored permanently on the application and visible whenever you reopen the candidate row.

A scorecard is a structured rubric for evaluating an interviewed candidate against the job's competencies. Each competency is rated 1 to 5 with an optional comment, and the interviewer picks an overall recommendation from Strong hire, Hire, No hire, or Strong no hire.

How this differs from "Log interview"

"Log interview" is for quick post-call notes (date, format, outcome, free text). Scorecards are for structured, multi-rater feedback that can be aggregated across interviewers. Both can coexist on the same candidate; use whichever fits the situation.

Adding a scorecard

Open the candidate from the job page and switch to the Scorecards tab. The tab header holds three buttons side by side: Edit competencies, + Invite interviewer, and + Add scorecard.

1. Click + Add scorecard
2. Pick an overall recommendation
3. Add an optional overall comment
4. Rate each competency on the 1 to 5 scale, with an optional comment on each
5. Click Save scorecard

Every active competency on the job's template must be rated before the scorecard will save. Partial scorecards are not accepted, so consensus comparisons stay clean.

The aggregation summary

Once a candidate has 2 or more scorecards, an automatic summary block appears above the individual cards. It shows the average rating per competency and the distribution of overall recommendations across all raters, so consensus and disagreement are both visible at a glance.

Every job has its own competency template. The same competencies are used on every scorecard for that job, so ratings are directly comparable across interviewers and across candidates within the role.

The first time you open the Scorecards tab on a job, Aptly seeds five default competencies: Technical fit, Communication, Experience match, Cultural fit, and Domain knowledge. You can adjust them at any time.

Opening the editor

1. Open any candidate in the job and switch to the Scorecards tab
2. Click Edit competencies

What you can change

• Rename a competency (✎ icon)
• Reorder using the up and down arrows next to each competency
• Remove a competency you no longer want on new scorecards (🗑 icon)
• Restore a competency you previously removed
• Add new competencies in the input row at the bottom of the editor as fresh themes emerge from earlier interviews

How removal works

Removed competencies stay attached to existing scorecards, so historical ratings aren't lost; new scorecards no longer see them. To bring one back, click Show removed at the bottom of the editor, then Restore next to the competency you want active again.

Hiring managers, client-side interviewers, or anyone outside your Aptly organisation can score a candidate without needing an Aptly account. You send them a tokenised link, they fill in the same competency rubric you use internally, and their submission lands alongside your team's scorecards.

Sending an invite

1. Open the candidate and switch to the Scorecards tab
2. Click + Invite interviewer
3. Enter their name, email, and an optional message
4. Click Send invite

Each invite link is unique to the invitee and expires 14 days after sending.

What the external interviewer sees

A clean public web page (no Aptly account required) showing the role title, the candidate's name, the full competency list, the rating controls, and the recommendation choices. The competency template is the same one your team uses, covered in Editing the competency template above.

Their submission appears in the candidate's scorecard list labelled Submitted by {name} (external), so internal and external feedback stay clearly distinguished in the aggregation summary.

Tracking pending invites

A Pending invites subsection in the Scorecards tab lists every outstanding invitation with its current status:

• Pending sent, recipient has not opened the link yet
• Opened the recipient has loaded the page but has not submitted
• Expired the 14-day window has passed without a submission
• Revoked you cancelled the invite manually

Actions on a pending invite

• Copy link to share manually if the email did not reach them
• Resend the email (limited to once per hour to prevent accidental spam)
• Revoke to cancel the invite immediately

Aptly generates a personalised, ready-to-send email for every candidate as part of each screening. The type of email depends on their verdict:

• Strong shortlist — one shortlist email, congratulating and inviting them forward
• Borderline — two options: Option A to progress, Option B to respectfully decline
• Do not progress — one personalised rejection that references their background — not a form letter

Sending emails

Expand a candidate row to view and edit the draft. Click Send email to send directly from Aptly, or Copy to paste it into your own email client.

Use the ✉ Send all emails button at the top of the results to send all generated emails in one click — useful after a large screening batch.

When you move a candidate to a key stage, a relevant draft email appears automatically at the top of their expanded row — no separate step required.

• Shortlisted — their original shortlist or progress email appears
• Interviewing — an interview invitation with placeholder date/format fields
• Offered — an offer notification with placeholder salary/start date fields
• Rejected — a context-appropriate rejection (different wording for post-interview versus initial screening rejections)

All drafts are editable inline before sending. The email appears highlighted in the context of the stage change so it's impossible to miss.

Aptly extracts email addresses directly from CV content. If a CV does not contain a clearly formatted email address, or if the address is embedded in a graphic or image-only PDF, extraction may fail.

In this case, the email preview will show No email address found in red. You can still copy the email body and send it manually from your own email client.

The candidate record in your database will also be missing an email — you can add it manually by opening their profile from the Candidates tab.

Every job can have a unique share link that lets your hiring manager view the shortlist, candidate scores, and reasoning — with no login required.

1. Open a job and click 🔗 Share
2. Choose an expiry (7 days up to no expiry)
3. Click Generate link
4. Copy and send to your client

What the client sees

Your agency logo, the ranked shortlist with scores and evidence, and a comment box on each candidate. They cannot see email addresses or contact details — only the professional screening information.

Managing the link

You can regenerate the link (with a new expiry) or revoke it entirely at any time from the same modal. Revoking immediately blocks all access via the old URL.

Clients can leave comments on individual candidates directly from the share page. You are notified by email when a comment is posted.

Comments are visible to you inside each candidate's expanded row in the job pipeline. Jobs with unread comments are flagged on your Home dashboard with a 💬 badge.

This replaces the need for back-and-forth emails about specific candidates — the client's feedback stays attached to the candidate it relates to.

The candidate portal is a personalised, no-login page that shows a candidate their current stage, a brief status description, and their fit profile for the role. It uses your agency logo and branding — no Aptly branding is shown to the candidate.

It is designed to replace the silence that candidates typically experience — they can check their status without calling or emailing you.

What the candidate sees

• Your agency logo and company name
• The job title they applied for
• Their current stage in plain English (e.g. "Your CV is being reviewed" or "You've been shortlisted")
• A personalised fit profile describing why they are a good match for the role
• A visual progress track

Expand any screened candidate's row and click 📬 Send portal link. Aptly will email them a unique, tokenised URL that only they can access — no password required.

The button only appears if the candidate has an email address on file. If it's missing, add it to their profile first.

Each portal link is permanent for that application — the stage shown updates automatically as you move the candidate through your pipeline, so you only need to send it once.

Your job board is a public page at aptly.pro/jobs/?agency=your-slug that lists all your live jobs. Candidates can view job descriptions and apply directly — their details arrive in your pipeline as Applied candidates, ready to screen.

Setting your agency URL

1. Go to My Profile → Company tab
2. Under Job board URL, enter your agency slug (e.g. nexus-recruitment)
3. Click Save URL

Your job board URL will be confirmed once saved. Share it anywhere — your website, LinkedIn, email signatures.

Open any job and click 🌐 Post. A confirmation modal explains what will be made public and shows your job board URL. Confirm to make it live.

When candidates apply

They appear at the top of the job as Applied — unscreened, in a separate panel from your screened candidates. From there you can:

• Click ✨ Screen next to any individual applicant to screen them (costs 1 scan)
• Click ✨ Screen all to process the whole unscreened queue at once

Once screened, they join your regular ranked pipeline.

Retracting a job

Click the 🌐 On board button to retract it. The job is immediately removed from your public board. Existing applications are not affected.

The shortlist PDF is a professional, white-labelled report you can send directly to clients. It includes your agency logo, candidate rankings, scores, evidence summaries, and the interview guide.

How to download

Open a job with screened candidates and click the ⬇ Download PDF button at the top of the candidates section. Generation takes a few seconds.

What's included

• Your agency logo and branding
• Candidate shortlist — ranked, with scores, verdicts, and evidence
• AI-CV flag indicators
• Hidden gem highlights
• Interview guide (opening questions, technical questions, red flags)

You can export the job description itself as a formatted PDF — useful for sending to candidates or keeping on file.

Open a job, expand the Job specification card, and click ⬇ Download spec. The exported PDF includes your job title and the full spec text.

Pro and Agency plans include multiple seats. To invite a colleague:

1. Go to My Profile → Company tab → Team
2. Enter their email address and click Send invite
3. They receive an email with a one-click acceptance link
4. Once accepted, they appear as a team member with full access to recruitment features

Roles

• Owner — full access including billing, branding, and team management. One per organisation.
• Member — full access to all recruitment features. Cannot access billing or remove other members.

Seat limits

• Starter — 1 seat
• Pro — 3 seats
• Agency — 10 seats

To add more seats, upgrade your plan in My Profile → Personal tab → Plan & billing.

To upgrade or change your plan, go to My Profile → Personal tab → Plan & billing. Select monthly or annual billing, then click the relevant plan button. You'll be taken to a secure checkout page.

Managing an existing subscription

If you are already on a paid plan, a Manage subscription → link appears below the plan grid. This opens the Stripe billing portal where you can update payment details, view invoices, or cancel.

Cancellation

Cancelling keeps your access until the end of your current billing period. After that, your account moves to the Free tier. Note that Free is a one-time 50-scan allowance, not a recurring monthly grant, so a returning Free user does not get a fresh batch of scans on rollover. Nothing is deleted: your jobs, candidates, and screening history are preserved.

Top-up scans

If you need extra scans without changing your plan, top-up packs are available as one-time purchases from My Profile → Personal tab → Plan & billing: 50 scans for $19, 150 scans for $49, or 500 scans for $149. Top-up scans never expire, carry over month to month, and are only used after your plan allowance runs out.

When you upgrade or buy a top-up pack, Stripe Checkout collects a few details on top of your card so your invoices and tax records are correct.

• Business name. Appears on every invoice. Use the legal entity name your finance team expects.
• Billing address. Required. Used on invoices and to determine the correct tax treatment for your region.
• Tax ID. Optional, collected in supported regions (VAT for the EU and UK, GST for several others). Adding it puts your tax number on every invoice and may zero-rate VAT where reverse charge applies.

You can update these details at any time from the Stripe billing portal. Open My Profile → Personal tab → Plan & billing and click Manage subscription →.

Your agency branding appears on all client-facing and candidate-facing pages — the share link shortlist, the candidate portal, the public job board, and PDF reports. No Aptly branding is shown on any of these pages.

What to set up

1. Go to My Profile → Company tab
2. Upload your logo (PNG, JPG, or SVG, max 500KB) under Company logo
3. Fill in your company name, industry, contact email, phone, website, and address under Company details
4. Save changes

Branding is applied to your entire organisation — all team members' jobs and outputs use the same logo and details.

The Clients section lets you maintain a list of your hiring companies, their contacts, and the jobs linked to each account — all in one place.

Adding a client

1. Go to Clients in the main navigation
2. Click + New client
3. Enter the company name and any relevant details
4. Add contacts under the client record — name, role, email, and phone

Linking a client to a job

When creating or editing a job, select the client from the Client dropdown. This links the job to the client record, and all related jobs appear together on the client's page so you can see everything you are running for a company at a glance.

The Aptly Intelligence API lets you submit CVs and a job spec programmatically and receive structured scoring results back — no Aptly UI required. It is designed for corporates, ATS platforms, and developers who want to embed CV intelligence directly into their own tools.

How it works

1. Submit a job spec and up to 200 CVs via a single POST request
2. Receive a job_id immediately — processing runs in the background
3. Poll for results via GET, or receive them automatically via webhook when complete
4. Each candidate result includes a score (0–100), a verdict, match reasons, and gaps

Verdict thresholds

• Strong shortlist — score 75 and above
• Borderline — score 50 to 74
• Do not progress — score below 50

Results are retained for 72 hours after completion, then automatically purged. Full endpoint documentation is available at aptly.pro/api-docs.html →

API access is enabled per organisation by Aptly support. Email hello@aptly.pro to request it and we will set you up.

Once enabled, the API Keys tab appears in My Profile. Until then the tab is hidden and key creation is refused. API keys authenticate your requests using the X-API-Key header. You can have up to 5 active keys per organisation, which is useful for separating environments or teams.

Creating a key

1. Go to My Profile → API Keys tab
2. Click Create key and give it a label
3. Copy the full key immediately. It is shown only once and cannot be retrieved again.
4. Store it securely (a password manager or secrets vault)

Revoking a key

Click Revoke next to any key in the API Keys tab. Revocation is immediate; any requests using that key will fail instantly. If you lose a key, revoke it and create a new one.