What is Indeed Smart Screening?

Smart Screening is a screening solution that uses your defined criteria and job requirements to evaluate applicants. Built on Indeed’s responsible AI principles while keeping recruiters at the core of hiring decisions, it screens and scores before candidates reach your applicant tracking system (ATS) and helps you review applications based on criteria you define.

Because it integrates with Indeed Apply, it fits into existing workflows without adding extra steps or systems for your team to manage.

When a candidate applies, Smart Screening begins reviewing the application right away. It learns your hiring criteria to review resume information and guide candidates through a conversational question-and-answer experience using an AI-powered recruiter.

Rather than relying only on resume keywords, Smart Screening is differentiated by its transparency and configuration. You and your team can create customized job criteria and adjust those criteria as hiring needs change, ensuring you define what “qualified” means for each role. The system applies those rules consistently and shows how each candidate was evaluated, including where they align with your requirements, how they align with the job description and where gaps may exist.

This happens before the candidate enters your ATS, so you can focus your time on reviewing screened applicants who meet your core requirements. By automating this early review, Smart Screening helps reduce the time your team spends on manual resume screening. According to Indeed test data, Smart Screening reduces average time-to-hire by 20%^[1], with 54%^[2] fewer applications on average needed to make a hire.

What are the core features of Smart Screening?

Smart Screening brings together several features that support early candidate review and move beyond traditional screening methods.

Instead of relying on manual review alone, these features help you gather more context about applicants before a recruiter begins sorting candidates in your ATS. The goal is to give your team a clearer, more complete view of each candidate early in the process.

AI Recruiter

AI Recruiter is designed to go beyond basic screening questions. Rather than asking a fixed set of yes-or-no prompts, it asks candidates questions on your behalf using an intelligent system. This means screening interactions can adapt in real-time based on candidate responses and the criteria you set for the role.

• Dynamic interaction: As candidates apply, the AI-powered agent asks them open-ended questions tied to your job requirements. These questions are meant to surface experience and context that may not be obvious from a resume alone.
• Flexible formats: Employers can set up different ways in which candidates can respond and react to screening questions. Candidates can complete these conversations in the format that works best for them—including chat, phone or video—from those made available by the employer. This can make the process easier for job seekers to complete right after applying.
• Contextual follow-up: When a response needs clarification, the AI Recruiter can ask follow-up questions to gather additional details. This creates an experience similar to a preliminary phone screen and helps capture more nuanced information without requiring immediate recruiter involvement, thereby saving your hiring team time.

For example, if you’re hiring a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) and require experience working with dementia patients, the AI Recruiter can shape the conversation around that requirement.

Rather than asking, “Do you have a CNA license (yes or no)?”, it might ask, “Tell me about your experience working with residents who have dementia,” then capture the depth and relevance of the candidate’s response for your review.

The Smart Fit Score™ and candidate summary

Smart Screening brings together information collected during screening in a format you can review directly in your ATS. It combines resume details, responses from the AI Recruiter to support quicker, more informed review.

• Smart Fit Score™: Each applicant receives a Smart Fit Score, shown as a number from 0 to 100, based on how closely they match the job criteria you defined. The Smart Fit Score is unique for every role and is based on the relevance of an employer’s defined criteria. This score makes it easier to view and prioritize candidates while still keeping the underlying details available for review.
• Candidate summary: Alongside the score, you’ll find a concise candidate summary. This highlights relevant strengths and notes potential gaps. For example, a summary might note the limited experience of a CNA candidate in restorative care programs, providing helpful context before you decide how to move forward.

Together, these features help you review candidates with more context upfront, so your team can get the right candidates into the review process earlier.

Benefits of using Smart Screening

Smart Screening can support hiring teams across multiple stages of the recruitment process. By shifting some of the screening work to earlier in the funnel, it can help your hiring team manage application volume more effectively and focus their time on quality candidates.

Refocusing on the human side of recruiting

One of the most immediate benefits of using Smart Screening is the time it saves for your recruiting team. By automating top-of-funnel screening—based on job criteria you define and can customize throughout the hiring process—recruiters can save time during hiring and reduce the effort spent reviewing applications that may not be a good fit.

That time can be redirected toward work that benefits from human interaction. This can be interviewing, explaining the company culture and closing employment offers.

Instead of sifting through hundreds of applications, recruiters using Smart Screening can begin with candidates who have been screened and scored based on your requirements. This allows your team to focus earlier on engaging with applicants who are more likely to meet your criteria.

“Having a preview of the candidate’s skills before the phone screen helps a lot. It gives me context upfront and makes the rest of the conversation more focused.” – Carolina A, Sr Recruiter, Indeed (employee)

Faster time to hire

Speed can play an important role in hiring, particularly for high-volume or time-sensitive roles. By identifying and engaging qualified candidates earlier in the process, Smart Screening helps build a pipeline of quality candidates who meet your core requirements and may help reduce delays between application and recruiter review.

At Principal Senior Living Group, Recruitment Coordinator Brandi Acheson would spend 5–7 minutes per resume, regardless of whether the candidate was qualified or not. With Smart Screening, her evaluations begin with a quick scan of the summary, ensuring the key checks are in place first. This helps ensure she can spend more time on qualified candidates and reach them more quickly.

“Instead of reviewing every resume, we can now focus on candidates who already meet the essential criteria. That has made our entire process far more efficient.” – Brandi Acheson, Recruitment Coordinator, Principal Senior Living Group

Smart Screening also helps speed up recruitment outside of your normal business hours. Because AI recruitment screening can take place outside standard business hours, candidates can complete the process soon after they apply. This can provide rich context about the candidate to reviewers sooner.

For example, a candidate might apply at 8:00 PM, complete their AI Recruiter by 8:15 PM and be ready for recruiter review first thing the next morning. This allows your hiring teams to move more quickly while keeping the review process consistent.

Cost efficiency

When a detailed screening happens later in the hiring process, recruiters may spend valuable time reviewing applications from candidates who do not meet must-have requirements. Manual review can be time-consuming and open roles may carry additional costs as labor hours add up and positions remain unfilled.

Smart Screening helps reduce time spent on applications that are unlikely to move forward. With fewer resources dedicated to late-stage filtering, teams can allocate their time and tools more effectively throughout the hiring process.

How Smart Screening works: A step-by-step guide

Smart Screening is designed to be flexible and straightforward to use, whether you’re hiring for a single role or managing more complex, enterprise-wide hiring needs. The setup and review process follows a clear sequence, allowing you to tailor screening to your roles while keeping your existing workflows intact.

1. Define your job criteria

The process starts with configuration. You tell the system exactly what you’re looking for in a candidate, based on the requirements of the role.

Smart defaults: To help you get started quickly, Smart Screening can apply smart defaults drawn from your job description and supplementary screener questions, giving you an initial set of scoring instructions without requiring extensive setup.

Custom rules: You can edit criteria for a single job or create “rules” for groups of current and future roles. Instead of manually configuring screening settings for every individual job, rules allow users to define “if/then” logic that applies standardized actions across multiple job postings based on specific criteria.

For example, your team might set a global rule for nursing positions that requires a specific license and a minimum number of years of experience. As part of this setup, you can distinguish between requirements that are must-haves and those that are nice-to-haves. This distinction helps calibrate screening results and supports more accurate Smart Fit Scores.

2. Candidate engagement

Once a job seeker applies, the Smart Screening process begins right away. The candidate is guided through the AI Recruiter interview using their preferred format from those provided by the employer. These options can include text, chat and/or video.

The screening experience is designed to work smoothly on Indeed to engage candidates immediately after they apply, irrespective of the device they use to apply. By keeping the process clear and accessible, Smart Screening can help reduce drop-off and capture relevant information while interest in the role is still high.

3. Review in your ATS

After screening is complete, results are delivered directly to your applicant tracking system. There is no need to switch between platforms to review candidate information. Smart Screening integrates with major ATS providers, such as Workday and iCIMS, allowing results to appear alongside candidate records you already use.

Within your ATS, you can find each candidate’s Smart Fit Score and review the advanced screening AI-generated summary to understand the reason behind the score and how the candidate aligned with your criteria. This summary is added alongside the resume within your ATS and includes other details like transcripts of the AI interview (if applicable) and other flagged information for you to review. Your team can also receive notifications through tools like Slack or Microsoft Teams* to make it easier to collaborate and move candidates forward together.

*This feature is coming soon and may not be available at launch.

Listen to and read responses: If you want to explore further, you can view the transcripts or listen to the audio of the AI Recruiter screening process to hear the candidate’s responses in their own words.

Best practices for using Smart Screening

Smart Screening is most effective when it’s used as part of your existing workflow. The following practices can help your team get more consistent and useful results while keeping you in control of hiring decisions.

Establish the criteria for your role

At the outset, set your must-have criteria for each role. This could include screener questions around shift availability, work location and more. Establishing these details at the start of the process can guide your process and help you and your hiring team derive the most value of early conversations with prospective candidates.

Refine your criteria regularly

As roles evolve or hiring priorities shift, adjusting screening criteria can help ensure screening continues to reflect what matters most for each position. Consider whether your must-haves are too strict or if nice-to-haves are too broad, as these settings directly influence how candidates are evaluated.

Smart Screening relies on the criteria you define and your job description. If Smart Fit Scores don’t align with how your team views candidates, revisiting and adjusting your screening criteria, including modifying or editing the job description, can support more consistent reviews and help keep results relevant over time.

Combine data with human insight

You can use data-driven information gathered during screening, including insights from the AI Recruiter, to prepare for more focused interviews. Because basic questions have already been answered, your live interviews can focus on areas that benefit from direct conversation, such as soft skills, work culture and behavioral questions.

You may also want to use the candidate summary as a preparation sheet for hiring managers. Reviewing strengths, potential gaps and suggested follow-up areas ahead of time can help your team focus interviews on the most relevant topics instead of revisiting information already collected.

Use AI as support, not a substitute

Indeed is committed to building and using AI responsibly. Smart Screening models are trained and audited for bias, while you remain in control of criteria, review outcomes and next steps throughout the hiring process.

Smart Screening is designed to augment your decision-making, not replace it. Employers should review candidates who are flagged or have missing information to understand why gaps appear.

In some cases, information may be missing because a resume is poorly formatted rather than because a candidate lacks a qualification. Using screening results alongside human recruiter judgment can help your team make more informed, balanced decisions.

Frequently asked questions about Smart Screening

Is Smart Screening Free?

No, You can purchase Smart Screening as a subscription. Your Indeed representative is best suited to assist you in purchasing and implementing Indeed Smart Screening into your recruiting workflow.

What is required for me to purchase Smart Screening?

In order to purchase Smart Screening, create or use an existing Indeed Employer account. The product works with a compatible ATS connection or Indeed Apply setup.

Speak with your Indeed representative to get started.

Does the Smart Fit Score depend on any third-party information?

No, Indeed’s Smart Fit Score does not use third-party data or inferences, and does not compare one candidate to another. Indeed’s Smart Fit Score includes only the information a candidate has directly shared with us, and is evaluated objectively against the employer’s job description & hiring criteria.

How will employers benefit from utilizing Smart Screening’s insights?

Smart Screening prioritizes transparency. When you review candidates, you can view how each application matched against the criteria you defined and why they received a particular Smart Fit Score. This visibility allows you to confidently move to the next step of your hiring process.

Does Smart Screening work for all types of jobs?

Smart Screening currently works on Indexed jobs and is effective for high-volume hiring, where efficiently managing application flow is important.

How does Smart Screening impact the candidate experience?

Candidates may value a faster response time and the opportunity to explain their experience beyond a static resume. The AI Recruiter allows candidates to share qualifications early in the process through a conversational format, which can support higher engagement with the application experience.

When employers contact a candidate soon after they apply, it can improve the experience for both the employer and the job seeker.

Will I need to change my ATS to use Smart Screening?

Smart Screening is designed to integrate with all major applicant tracking systems. For employers with custom technology stacks are also available to support integration.

How does Indeed ensure transparency and responsible AI in hiring products like Smart Screening?

Indeed is committed to building and deploying AI responsibly, with transparency and compliance at the core. These products, from testing to launch, were developed in close collaboration with Indeed’s Responsible AI team, which continues to guide the beta testing and future development. Learn more about Indeed’s Responsible AI principles here.

Our system evaluates candidates against objective, job-related criteria you set. This supports more consistent evaluation in early stages of review. Hiring decisions remain the responsibility of people, with AI used to assist, rather than replace, human judgment.

Can recruiters review and override AI recommendations?

Yes. Indeed’s tools are not a substitute for human discretion or review. Employers can control and modify their criteria. Employers are encouraged to review every candidate holistically and are free to disregard AI summaries and recommendations.

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