Most CVs that come to us with a gap handle it in one of two ways. Either the dates simply jump, 2019 to 2021, and nothing accounts for the missing eighteen months. Or there is a line that says "2019 to 2021: unemployed", which is accurate and tells a reader almost nothing.
Neither is fatal. Both waste an opportunity, because a shortlister working through a chronology has to be able to follow it, and an unexplained break interrupts the reading. They stop and wonder. Whatever they conclude in that pause, you did not choose it.
Date it properly, then account for it
Use months, not just years. "2019 to 2021" could be four months or thirty-four. If the actual gap was July 2019 to February 2020, write that, and a seven-month break stops looking like a two-year one. A surprising number of apparent gaps turn out to be an artefact of year-only dating.
Then give the period a plain line in the chronology, in the same format as your jobs. It belongs in sequence with everything else, not quarantined in an apologetic paragraph at the bottom.
What the line should say
State what occupied the time, in the same register you would use for a post. These are the ones we see most, and they need quite different handling.
Examinations. If you were preparing for or sitting professional examinations, say so and name them. This is one of the few gaps that reads as productive on its face, and it is regularly left off entirely because candidates do not think of study as employment. Include the outcome if you passed. If you did not pass, you can still state the period accurately without stating a result.
Relocation or visa processing. Immigration timelines are outside your control and readers generally know it. For International Medical Graduates, gaps of this type are particularly common around relocation, GMC registration, examinations and preparation for UK practice. "Relocated to the UK; awaiting visa and GMC registration" is a complete explanation that needs no apology attached.
Caring responsibilities or parental leave. A short factual line is enough. You do not owe anyone the details.
Health. You may state that you took a period of medical leave without naming a condition, and most people should. There is a real difference between accounting for a period and disclosing a diagnosis, and the CV only requires the first. This is worth taking advice on if your situation is complicated, and we are not the people to give it.
Looking for work and not finding it. The hardest one, and the most common. What helps is anything you did keep doing: CPD, courses, teaching, voluntary clinical work, an audit you stayed involved with. If there is genuinely nothing, a short honest line still beats silence.
Do not inflate it
The temptation with a long gap is to make the period sound busier than it was. We will not do this and you should not either. If you describe a gap in terms that imply clinical activity that did not happen, you have created a problem that outlives the application, because the claim sits in writing and someone may ask about it at interview.
The line to hold is that everything on the CV must be true. Presentation is negotiable. Facts are not.
What we do not know
How much any individual shortlister discounts a gap, we cannot tell you. It probably depends on the post, the panel and how many applications they are reading that afternoon. Anyone offering you a number on this is guessing. What we can say from the documents is narrower and more useful: an accounted-for gap stops interrupting the read, and an unaccounted-for one does not.
A quick test
Read your own chronology from the top and stop at the first point where you would have to ask a question. If that point is the gap, it needs a line. If you get to the end without stopping, leave it alone.
This is a guide to writing a CV. It is not legal, immigration or employment advice, and nothing here should be relied on as such.