Free template
A job application tracker template is a spreadsheet with one row per application and columns for company, role, date applied, status and next action. Download the CSV below and open it in Google Sheets or Excel. The column that matters most is Next action date: sorting by it turns a list of things you did into a list of things you owe, which is what keeps applications from going cold.
No email required. Opens in Google Sheets, Excel, Numbers or LibreOffice.
Download the file, then in Google Sheets choose File, Import, Upload, and select it. Pick Replace spreadsheet so the header row is kept. In Excel it is File, Open. The five example rows are there to show the shape; delete them before you start.
Fifteen, and two of them are the ones most templates leave out.
When you stop updating it, which is usually the week you get busy enough for it to matter. A spreadsheet cannot notice that a rejection arrived or that a recruiter replied, so every row is only as current as your last manual edit. That is not a flaw in the template; it is the ceiling of the format.
The Mbason AI application tracker is the same board with the updating taken off you: each application gets its own forwarding email address, so when a reply lands the status moves by itself. Use the spreadsheet for as long as it works. Switch when the part that breaks is the updating rather than the tracking.
One row per application, with columns for company, role, date applied, status and next action. Download the template below, delete the example rows, and add your own. Sort by Next action date at the start of each week; that single sort is the difference between a log of what you did and a plan for what you owe.
Yes, this one. Download the CSV, then in Google Sheets choose File, Import, Upload and pick the file. Choose Replace spreadsheet to keep the headers. It works the same way in Excel through File, Open. There is no email wall on the download.
Company, role, location, work mode, source, job URL, salary range, date applied, status, next action, next action date, contact name, contact email, resume version and notes. Most templates skip the last two. Resume version tells you which file earned the reply, and next action date is what stops an application going quiet.
Google Sheets, for one practical reason: it is open on your phone. Applications go cold in the gaps between sitting at a desk, and the tracker you actually update is the one you can reach on a bus. Use Excel if your search is short or you already live in it.
After roughly four weeks and two follow-ups. It is an arbitrary line and that is the point: without one, dead applications sit in your pipeline looking alive and your numbers stop meaning anything. Move it to Ghosted, keep the row, and let the sheet show you the real conversion rate.
When you stop updating it. A spreadsheet cannot notice that a rejection email arrived, so every row is only as current as your last manual edit, and in a busy week that is where it breaks. That is the difference with the Mbason AI tracker: each application gets a forwarding email address, so status changes as the replies land. It is free for your first five applications and part of Gold after that, while the spreadsheet stays free forever, so switch only when the updating is the part that keeps failing.
Mbason AI is a free job board with a built-in application tracker. The board is free and the tracker covers your first five applications free; past that, Gold tracks up to 500 applications. The spreadsheet above has no limit at all, which is the honest reason to start there.