Is SuperYachtResume worth $47 a template? A captain graded all 419

Nobody has published an independent review of SuperYachtResume. I searched on 2026-08-18 and found their own social pages, a directory listing, and a handful of unrelated results. So I did the work myself. I built SeaPapers, which competes with them, so read this knowing that, and hold me to the method rather than the verdict.

The method, stated plainly

On 2026-08-17 I captured every CV template SuperYachtResume had listed, 419 of them, and graded each one on the same ten point scale I use when a CV lands in my hand at the top of a passerelle. One serving superyacht captain, one scale, one sitting, in a single day.

The scale scored six things. Does my eye land on photo, name and position sought before anything else. Do certificates and their dates get a real block rather than a line buried in a sidebar. Does the design hold to two pages once real content is in it. Does it print on a marina printer without drinking a cartridge. Does it read standing up, at arm's length, in daylight. And does it look like a yacht CV rather than a graduate scheme application.

That is a captain's grading, not a designer's. It measures whether the page does the job it exists for. Somebody else with a different scale would land somewhere else, and I would read their numbers with interest.

What the 419 showed

Mean score: 7.0 out of 10. That is the headline and it is not a hit piece number. A 7.0 is a competent, professional CV. I have never binned a CV for its layout at that level.

Best single template: 9.0. There is genuinely good work in this catalogue. The top end is better than most of what crew hand me.

Distinct layouts: 27. This is the finding that changes the purchase. When I sorted the 419 by the actual structure of the page rather than by the product name on the listing, they resolved into 27 designs. The same layout appears repeatedly under different names, colours and department labels. Their sitemap on 2026-08-18 listed 540 URLs, most of them one template each, which is a large shop front for 27 underlying designs.

Examples withheld until purchase. Across those template pages I found thumbnail images of the layout and the layout's name. I found no page showing readable, filled in CV content before payment. You are buying a design you have squinted at.

What $47 actually gets right

I want the credit paragraph to be real, because the criticism above is real too.

The department organisation is correct. Crew think in departments, and being able to go straight to the engineering shelf rather than scroll a generic gallery is a genuine kindness. The typography on the better templates is disciplined, with the position sought given proper weight under the name, which is exactly where I look second. Several layouts give certificates a dedicated block instead of squeezing them into a sidebar, and that block is the reason I call people.

They publish a refund guarantee in plain language on their own site, saying that if you are not happy and see no improvement in results, they will refund you (cv-templates-and-tool-kit, seen 2026-08-18). Most small products do not put that in writing. There is also a human writing service for people who would rather someone else find the words, and update add ons listed at $25, $35 and $50 depending on how many jobs you want the CV retuned for.

And the file is yours. You download a Word version and a Pages version, you keep them, you edit them in five years when you are a bosun. That is a real thing to own.

What a template cannot do

A file is a file. Four limits follow from that, and none of them are a criticism of their craft.

No expiry field, because a Word document has no fields. Your STCW and ENG1 dates are strings you typed. They can end up in three different formats on one page, or missing on the one certificate that mattered, and nothing notices. A certificate without a date reads to me as a certificate you do not hold.

No live check on two pages. The template is designed for two pages. Whether your version stays there is between you and the page break. Every third page CV I have been handed started life as a well designed two page template.

No document folio. The CV opens the conversation. Then a purser asks for STCW modules, ENG1, passport, visas and two references, and you are on a dock hunting through your email. A template has nothing to say about that, and does not claim to.

Desktop software required. Their own help page states that free or online versions of Word will not work, and that you need a downloaded, licensed copy of Word or Apple Pages (cv-template-help, seen 2026-08-18). If you are working off a crew house laptop or a phone, that is a real obstacle before you have written a word.

From the bridge: I once read two CVs from the same boat, same season, that were obviously the same paid template. One got an interview and one did not. The difference was that one of them had dated certificates and the other had a skills wheel.

Who should buy one, and who should not

Buy one if you already have Word or Pages, you are past your first season, you know what belongs on a yacht CV, and you want a distinctive layout you own and reuse. At the top of that catalogue there is a 9.0 sitting there for $47.00, and if you land on it you have bought well. The refund line gives you a fallback if you do not.

Do not buy one if you are green and counting what is left after STCW, ENG1 and a flight. What you need first is not a layout. It is the right fields, dated certificates, honest vessel entries including daywork, and two pages of discipline. All of that is available for nothing, from more than one source, and a 7.0 layout will not beat a 6.0 layout with correct dates in it.

The route that costs nothing

If you are in the second group, do this instead. Open the SeaPapers editor and type your real details into it. It is free to use, it prompts you for the yacht fields rather than leaving you to guess them, it holds you to two pages while you type, and you can look at the preview before you decide anything. A Pro tier covers clean PDF export when you want it.

You will know within ten minutes whether the page in front of you would survive my thirty seconds. That is a better test than any review, including this one.

For the direct feature comparison, read SeaPapers vs SuperYachtResume. For the wider field, including the free Word templates that show their filled in examples, read SuperYachtResume alternatives.

Or just open the editor and see for yourself.