🙌 7 Tips to Build Your GitHub Profile Like a PRO 🚀 (2024)

Posted on Nov 16, 2023 • Updated on Dec 7, 2023

#webdev #javascript #programming #tutorial

Hey friends 👋

Ever gone to someone's Github's profile and thought:

In this article, I will attempt to show you that building a professional GitHub profile is much easier than you think.

That's right, even if you are not a seasoned expert, you can make your profile look solid.

Here's an example of my GitHub Profile. Let's dive into how you can get your profile looking just as good in the next 10 minutes. 😉

Ready, set, let's gooo ⏰

If you haven't already done it, you must create your own GitHub README to build your profile page.

For this, head to your profile and click on Your repositories.

After that, create a New repository:

The repo's name needs to be the same as your username.
Make sure to make the repo Public
Click on Add a README file

I discovered this repo not so long ago, and I fell in love with it.❤️

This cool project helps you build your own GitHub profile in no time!

Go to GitHub Profile README Generator and fill in your information.

Note: You don't need to complete every section; only the relevant ones.

Once completed:

Click on Generate README
Then click on copy-markdown
Head over to your newly created GitHub profile and paste the code inside your README 💪

You should now have a profile that is starting to look pretty slick!

To up your game, you can add some elegant widgets that provide valuable stats to showcase your skills and achievements. 🚀⭐️

In my case, I have added these to my profile:

You can also add some Widgets to showcase your Web3 or StackOverflow experience:

These Widgets are completely free of use, and you can get them by signing up to quine.sh.

Simply head over to "Widgets" on your Quine profile and paste the copied Wiget code into your README page.

It is possible that you don't like some of the designs from the GitHub README generator. 🙃

Some people prefer a different style, especially pertaining to their social links/linkouts.

Here's an alternative style you can use:

If you like this style, you can create your own badge using this synthax:

![<Badge Name>](https://img.shields.io/badge/<Badge Text>-<Background Color>?style=for-the-badge&logo=<Icon Name>&logoColor=<Logo Color>)

For example, if you wanted to add your GitHub badge, it would be:

![github](https://img.shields.io/badge/GitHub-000000?style=for-the-badge&logo=GitHub&logoColor=white)]

Depending on the type of banner icons you want to show, you can find a lot of neat icons in this list here. 🙌

If you have already built up a couple of projects, this is the right opportunity to showcase the ones you are most proud of!

On your profile, simply click on Customize your pins and select up to 6 projects that you want to pin.

After your pin repositories, your profile will show the below grid.

This represents your contributions and level of activity on GitHub.

It is important to emphasise that although you should try to showcase your consistency by contributing often, the % of "green-ness" on this bar is not the most important aspect. 👀

Many people focus on trying to build a perfect streak, but in reality, their work is not impactful, and their contributions are of little value.

In my opinion (and I believe a lot of people share this sentiment), contributions should be focused on:

Quality > Quantity ❤️

Having said that, it is in your interest to build a couple of projects or contribute to other people's projects regularly.

Now, to try to contribute to projects, there are various tools you can use.

🔎 Here are 3 free sites which can help you find the next project to work on:

Alternatively, if this is your first time contributing, I have created this step-by-step article for first-timers. You will learn the mechanics of contributing on GitHub and be able to contribute in the next 10 min!

We are ready to make the final touches...

Your profile should look pretty fire by now. 🔥

The last thing I would advise you to do is to complete your Bio.

When you are on your profile page, head over to the left side underneath your picture and click on Edit Profile.

Add a brief description of yourself and you are good to go!

That's it for now. 😄

I hope you are happy with your polished GitHub profile! 💅

I must emphasise that my profile is still far from being the best in the world...

However, with these free tools at your disposal, you will be able to customise a fantastic new profile!

This is why I'd love to take a sneak peek and get inspired by the cool profiles you will build! 👀

Share your brand-new profiles in the comment section! 🙌

See you next week.

Your Dev.to buddy,

Bap 💚

If you want to join the self-proclaimed "coolest" server in open source 😝, you should join our discord server. We are here to help you on your journey in open source. 🫶

Quine

For each open GitHub Issue, there’s a developer waiting to solve it 💘

Top comments (63)

Jon Randy 🎖️

🤖 Artisanal developer - coding with varying degrees of success since 1983

Location

Bangkok 🇹🇭
Joined

Jun 1, 2018

• Nov 17 '23 • Edited on Nov 19 • Edited

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I've interviewed many, many candidates over a considerable number of years in companies both large and small - and not once have I remotely cared what someone's GitHub profile looks like. I am far more concerned about the activity and content in the GitHub account. A flashy profile tells an employer next to nothing about a candidate's abilities, and any hiring team who knows what they're doing will look straight past any such distractions.

I've also noticed that most of the best candidates I've interviewed or hired have not had a portfolio website, or a customised GitHub profile.

Bap

A bit of content creation here and there 👀 DevRel Lead @Quine - Ex-TikTok & Uber in Analytics

Education

Imperial College London
Work

DevRel Lead @Quine
Joined

May 3, 2023

• Nov 17 '23

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Interesting, thanks for sharing! I think what you are saying does make a lot of sense. Some devs are insanely good and don't spend too much time thinking about these things. I think it's still a great idea to have a nice profile as there are good and bad ways of presenting yourself to the community. At the end of the day, what matters in the context of finding a job are your experience, how you perform in the interviews and whether there is a good fit culturally; so I agree with you there. Thanks for the comment 🙏

Jon Randy 🎖️

🤖 Artisanal developer - coding with varying degrees of success since 1983

Location

Bangkok 🇹🇭
Joined

Jun 1, 2018

• Nov 19 '23 • Edited on Nov 19 • Edited

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Some devs are insanely good and don't spend too much time thinking about these things

So, you agree that the best candidates have little time/concern for such curated vanity projects?

Rodrigo M.S.

Founder @quine

Location

London, UK
Joined

Jan 25, 2021

• Nov 18 '23

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I agree that the most informative part of a GitHub profile is the user's contribution activity rather than "how pretty it looks".

The problem is that making sense of someone's GitHub activity can be super difficult. Contributions are often scattered across various repos and it can be very difficult to put all that activity in context. Portfolios, widgets, and the "add ons" that @fernandezbaptiste suggests don't only make profiles look great. They also help devs highlight the most relevant parts of their GitHub activity (and their personas!).

I have interviewed hundreds of developers in the past few years. A pretty profile will not get you a job, but if the profile is able to communicate your relevance in a clear and neat way it'll likely get you an interview.

Jon Randy 🎖️

🤖 Artisanal developer - coding with varying degrees of success since 1983

Location

Bangkok 🇹🇭
Joined

Jun 1, 2018

• Nov 19 '23 • Edited on Nov 20 • Edited

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I understand that you're both trying to sell a product, and that my comments fly in the face of the whole premise of your business, but the reality is that developer jobs are not modelling contests.

If hiring teams are doing their jobs well, and know what they are looking for - they simply will not be looking at how flashily presented a candidate is... they will be looking for evidence of a passion and talent for coding and development. Dismissing candidates because their profile is presented 'poorly' (which is totally subjective anyway), is utter madness. If you choose to select based on criteria such as these, you're probably throwing out a lot of the best candidates.

The problem in a lot of companies is that the first port of call for incoming candidate profiles is non-technical HR staff, who really have no idea what to look for in a good developer. I've seen so much time wasted in the hiring process because of candidates being forwarded that 'look' good to HR, only to be soundly rejected when reviewed by more technical team members. I fully believe that technically competent staff should be involved in the hiring process ASAP - it saves an awful lot of time, and prevents good candidates being rejected for no reason other than subjective opinions of how attractively the candidate 'presents' themselves.

It is extremely common in my experience that a fancy GitHub profile or portfolio website is often more like "lipstick on a pig" (if you'll pardon the expression), or nothing more than clickbait. If you scratch the surface with a lot of these, you'll often find little substance underneath, and scant evidence of a competent developer... they are often the profiles of well intentioned (very) junior developers who have been misled by content/service promoters into thinking that this route is the best way to get noticed and/or hired. The harsh reality is that it really isn't.

I'm not saying there is anything wrong with having these things per se... but they should be things you think about as very much secondary concerns. Your primary concern should be cultivating a passion for your craft, and building cool, interesting stuff - not generating another cookie cutter 'developer profile' that will not differentiate you from anyone. This isn't social media, and development is not about getting 'likes'.

Be yourself. Present yourself how you want to be seen, not how others say you should be doing so.

Janko Andreyev

Joined

Jun 2, 2023

• Nov 19 '23

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Based

Bap

A bit of content creation here and there 👀 DevRel Lead @Quine - Ex-TikTok & Uber in Analytics

Education

Imperial College London
Work

DevRel Lead @Quine
Joined

May 3, 2023

• Nov 20 '23

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I agree Jon, this is most definitely secondary to the actual work and code you have produced. Thanks a lot for taking the time to share your thoughts on this. I really appreciate it 🙏