Yes, you can put webinars on your resume, but only if they add real weight to your application. List them under a “Professional Development” or “Certifications” section rather than mixing them with jobs. Include the webinar title, provider and date, and only add ones tied to the role you want. Skip anything vague like “attended marketing webinar” as it looks like padding rather than a skill gained.
The short version: No, don’t list webinars you simply attended, sitting through a 45 minute session and clicking a few polls is not an achievement. Only include a webinar on your resume if you can attach a result, a certificate from a recognised body, or a skill you applied afterwards. Otherwise it takes up space that should be doing much harder work for you.
The space on your resume is not free
I’ve reviewed hundreds of CVs over the years, first as someone building teams for my own agency, then as a judge and speaker who gets sent CVs from people asking for feedback or mentoring. Most people treat resume space like it’s unlimited. It isn’t. A recruiter or hiring manager gives your CV somewhere between six and eight seconds on the first pass, according to eye-tracking research that gets cited every year in recruitment trade press. Every line you add is competing for a fraction of that time.
A line that says “Attended: Social Media Marketing World, 2025” tells a hiring manager almost nothing. It doesn’t say what you learned, what you did with it, or whether you were even paying attention. Compare that to “Implemented email segmentation strategy learned at a marketing conference, increasing open rates by 14% within two months.” Same event, wildly different value on the page.
A story from my own hiring mistakes
Years ago I hired someone for a client-facing marketing role partly because her CV listed six webinars and two virtual summits under a section called “Continuing Education.” I was impressed by the breadth of it, HubSpot’s Inbound, a Google Ads masterclass, something on email deliverability. In the interview I asked her to walk me through what she’d changed in her own work because of the deliverability session. She went quiet, then said she’d meant to look into it but hadn’t got round to it.
That was the moment I understood something I now tell every person I mentor: a list of webinars attended is often a list of intentions, not accomplishments. It made her look curious on paper and unfinished in the room. I still hired her, she was strong in other ways, but I never again read a “webinars attended” section without asking myself what’s behind it.
The uncomfortable bit nobody wants to say out loud
Here’s the part most career advice avoids. A long list of webinars can quietly work against you, because it can read as evidence you spend your working hours consuming rather than producing. If your CV shows fifteen webinars over two years and no promotions, no measurable wins, no client results in that same window, a sharp reader will notice the gap. It suggests someone who collects information as a form of comfort rather than someone who acts on it. That’s not fair to everyone who lists webinars, plenty of people apply what they learn, but hiring managers pattern match fast, and this is one of the patterns they’ve learned to spot.
I say this as someone who has sat through more webinars than I can count, including plenty run by people worth watching regularly for SEO insight. Attending is valuable. Listing attendance as if it were an achievement is where people go wrong.
When a webinar is worth including
There are exceptions, and they’re specific enough to use as a checklist:
- It came with a formal certificate from a recognised body, such as HubSpot Academy, Google Skillshop, or a university extension programme, and you can name that certificate rather than the event.
- You can tie it directly to a result you produced within three to six months of attending.
- It’s relevant to a niche skill gap for the specific role you’re applying for, and you have almost nothing else to show that skill.
- It was part of a structured programme rather than a one off session, for example a six part series that functioned more like a short course.
If none of those apply, leave it off. Your time and the reader’s time are both better spent elsewhere on the page.
How to word it if you do include it
If a webinar clears that bar, don’t list it under “webinars attended.” Fold it into a Professional Development section and phrase it as a skill, not an event. Here’s the difference in practice:
- Weak: “Attended digital marketing webinar, March 2025.”
- Better: “Completed HubSpot Content Marketing Certification (2025), applied to restructure blog content strategy.”
- Weak: “Attended AI in Business webinar series.”
- Better: “Completed a five part AI implementation training programme; used the frameworks to cut internal reporting time by 20%.”
Notice the pattern. Every strong version names a specific outcome or number. If you can’t fill in that second half of the sentence honestly, that’s your answer on whether to include it at all.
What’s usually more valuable than the webinar itself
This is the part people miss. The webinar rarely matters as much as what you did around it. Did you go on to network with three people from the chat and turn one into a client? Did you take the free session and use it as the reason to enrol in something with actual accreditation, like an online MBA programme or a structured e-learning course you could later monetise into your own offer? Those are the stories worth telling on a CV, and they make the original webinar into a footnote rather than the headline.
The same logic applies to conferences and industry events generally. I’ve written before about the power of networking for business owners, and the honest truth is that the relationships built at an event outlast the content of any single session by years. If you want a line on your CV about a conference, make it about a connection or a project it led to, not about the fact you were in the room.
What this looks like for career changers specifically
If you’re switching industries and have thin direct experience, I understand the pull to pad your CV with every webinar and workshop you’ve sat through. It feels like proof you’re serious. But hiring managers in a new field are looking for transferable proof of action, not proof of attendance. If you attended a webinar on lead generation while trying to break into marketing, better to say you took what you learned and built out a small campaign, even an unpaid or personal project, than to list the webinar alone. I still point people towards ideas like the ones in unconventional lead generation ideas as a way to generate a real, describable project rather than another line that says you watched something once.
The quick test before you write the line
Before you add any webinar to your CV, ask yourself these three questions in order:
- Did I get a certificate, credential, or formal completion I can name?
- Did I do something measurable afterward that I can quantify?
- Is this the strongest use of this line, or is there a stronger achievement competing for the same space?
If you answer no to the first two, the answer to the third is almost always yes, there’s something better you could be putting there instead. Cut the webinar line and use the space on a real number from your actual work.
Frequently asked questions
Should I list every webinar I’ve attended on my CV?
No. Listing every webinar you’ve attended dilutes your resume and can suggest you consume content more than you produce results. Include only webinars tied to a formal certificate or a measurable outcome you can name.
Where should webinars go on a resume if I do include them?
Put them under a Professional Development or Certifications section, never mixed in with actual work experience. Phrase each one as a completed credential with an outcome attached, not as an event you simply showed up to.
Do recruiters care about webinar attendance?
Most recruiters skim past generic “attended webinar” lines within seconds, because attendance alone proves nothing about capability. What catches attention is a specific result, a named certification, or a skill you can demonstrate in an interview.
What should I list instead if I remove my webinars?
Replace it with a specific project, result, or number from your actual work, even a small one. A single line like “increased email open rates by 14%” will outperform ten lines of webinar names every time.
