Quick Answer
No major job board lets you build a saved keyword blocklist. Indeed's dash operator excludes a word, but only in the search you type it into. LinkedIn documents no way to exclude a word from a job search.
The two approaches to filter jobs by keywords:
- Native search operators: on Indeed, type
software engineer -senior -contractinto the search box. It works for that search only, and it checks the whole listing. - HideJobs: add keywords once and they're hidden on every job site HideJobs supports, including LinkedIn and Indeed. Matches the text on job cards. Your list stays until you change it.
Most effective keywords to block: seniority mismatches (senior, director, intern), employment type (contract, temporary, part-time), work format (hybrid, on-site). Avoid short abbreviations like sr or vp, because they can match unintended listings.
Every job board lets you search by keyword. None of them let you reliably exclude by keyword. A search for "product manager" returns Senior Product Managers, Directors of Product, agency contract listings, and part-time roles, all in the same results. You scroll past the same mismatches every session because there's no way to build a blocklist that actually sticks.
When I built HideJobs, filtering the same noise manually across multiple platforms every day was the exact frustration that drove it. LinkedIn's Boolean NOT resets every session and can't be saved as a filter. Indeed has no exclusion feature at all. Glassdoor, Monster, ZipRecruiter, Seek, SimplyHired: same story. The noise compounds when you're searching across all of them at once with no way to filter consistently.
This guide explains which keywords are worth blocking (and which short ones to avoid), why native tools don't deliver it, and how to set up filtering that works automatically across every platform. For a parallel problem, see also excluding companies from your job search.
What Do Job Seekers Actually Want to Filter Out?
The listings worth filtering share one thing: their signal is visible on the job card itself, before you even open the posting. Looking at what HideJobs users actually block, three types show up consistently across every platform.
- Seniority levels you're not targeting. A search for "software engineer" returns Senior Engineers, Directors, and Staff-level roles alongside mid-level ones. The seniority filter helps but misses plenty. Blocking the exact words from the job title is more reliable.
- Work format or employment type you're not looking for. Remote-only searches still surface on-site and hybrid listings. Full-time searches mix in contract and part-time roles. These labels appear directly on the card.
- Industries, niches, or platforms you don't want. Job titles regularly contain words that immediately rule a role out: an industry ("cannabis", "alcohol"), a platform ("TikTok"), or a niche ("B2C", "digital"). Blocking those words keeps them out without affecting anything else.
Why Don't Native Keyword Filters Work?
Both LinkedIn and Indeed let you search by keyword, but neither gives job seekers what they actually need: a saved blocklist that applies every time they search.
LinkedIn Boolean "NOT": what it actually does
LinkedIn's Boolean search help page documents NOT, typed in capital letters, for the search bar at the top of the page. A job search like this one may drop some matches:
software engineer NOT senior NOT contract NOT staffing
Three practical limitations:
- It isn't documented for job search. The help page doesn't say whether these operators apply to LinkedIn Jobs, so there is no documented way to exclude a word from a LinkedIn job search or job alert.
- It isn't a filter. There's no setting that keeps a word out of every search: you type the exclusions into each query.
- It only works on LinkedIn. Other job boards have their own syntax, or none.
Indeed: a dash in the search box
Indeed documents a dash operator in its job seeker help center: nurse -intern leaves out listings with "intern." There's no space after the dash, and you need at least one normal keyword in the query. The dash checks the whole listing, not just the title, so -senior can also drop jobs that only mention a senior team. And it only applies to the search you type it into. Our guide to Indeed's advanced search operators covers the rest, including Indeed's Not interested preferences.
The result: job seekers who search across multiple platforms retype exclusions on Indeed, guess on LinkedIn, and start over on every other site. The same applies whether you're blocking seniority levels or filtering out reposted listings.
What Keywords Should You Hide Jobs By?
Each of the three categories above maps to specific words. Here's what to actually add to your blocklist for each one.
Seniority keywords (block the levels you're not targeting):
seniorsr.directorvpvice presidentprincipalstaffheadinterninternshipentry leveljuniorBlock the levels above or below where you are in your career. A senior engineer blocks intern and entry level. A recent graduate blocks director, VP, and principal. You don't need to add both sides. Add only what you'd immediately skip.
Be careful with short abbreviations:
Short terms like sr, vp, jr can accidentally match jobs that contain those letters in another context. A company called "Stripe VP Platform" would be hidden if you block vp. When in doubt, use the full word: senior instead of sr, junior instead of jr. Longer terms are more precise and less likely to produce false positives.
Work format keywords (visible on job cards):
hybridon-siteremotein-officeWork format appears directly on job cards across all platforms. If you need fully remote, block hybrid and on-site. If you prefer in-office, block remote. These are among the most reliable keywords to block because they're always card-visible.
Employment type keywords (visible on job cards):
contractpart-timetemporaryinternshipvolunteerfreelanceEmployment type often shows on the job card. Blocking contract removes contract and contract-to-hire listings that surface this label on the card. Use a company exclusion list to catch staffing agencies whose cards don't label the role as contract.
Industry, niche, or platform keywords (examples):
cannabisalcoholgamblingcryptoTikTokB2CdigitalstaffingThese are personal: what you block depends entirely on what you want to avoid. The examples above are common ones, but your list will look different. Any word that appears consistently in titles or company names you skip is worth adding.
Start with 5–10 keywords that match the listings you skip most often. The list builds naturally over time. You don't need to add everything at once. The goal is to stop reprocessing the same noise every session, not to build a perfect list before you begin.
How to Filter Jobs by Keywords with HideJobs
HideJobs has a Keywords filter in its Job Search Filters panel. It applies your saved keyword list on every job site HideJobs supports, including LinkedIn and Indeed. Any job card whose visible text contains a keyword from your list is hidden.
How to use the Keywords filter in HideJobs:
- Install the HideJobs browser extension
- Open HideJobs on a job search page and turn on Keywords in Job Search Filters
- Type a keyword and press Enter (add as many as you like)
- Job cards whose visible text (mostly the title, company, and location) contains one of your keywords are hidden
- To use the list on another computer, open the gear next to Keywords and save it to your HideJobs account, then load it there
A Keywords badge at the edge of the job page shows how many jobs your keywords are hiding. Click it to see them again, and click it once more to hide them.
The keyword list works the same way on every platform you search. Add senior, lead, or intern once and they're blocked on LinkedIn, Indeed, and every other site HideJobs supports. No platform-specific setup, no re-entering your list per site.
When I built this feature, I started with a list of about eight keywords. The first session after setting it up is the one that makes the value obvious, you realize how many listings you were reflexively skipping before.
This matters most for job seekers searching across multiple boards simultaneously. Whether you're filtering down to niche roles or trying to avoid jobs with 100+ applicants, seeing the same irrelevant listings on every platform compounds the time cost of every session.
Combining Keyword and Company Filters for the Cleanest Results
Keyword blocking and company exclusion solve overlapping but distinct problems. Keyword filters catch role types and contract structures regardless of who posted them. Company exclusions catch specific employers, typically agencies that don't telegraph themselves through keyword phrases. Together they cover the two main sources of search noise that native platform filters miss entirely.
How the two filters work together:
- Keyword blocking catches: seniority mismatches (
senior,director,intern), employment type (contract,temporary), work format (hybrid,on-site), and any phrase visible on job cards that appears in listings you skip. - Company exclusion catches: staffing agencies and employers you've specifically decided to stop seeing, including ones that don't use distinctive keyword phrases in their postings. See the full guide to excluding companies from your job search.
Using both filters together produces the cleanest results: you eliminate role types you'd skip regardless of employer, and you eliminate specific employers regardless of how their listings are written. The combination also reduces the risk of missing a relevant listing because a single filter was too broad.
Other filters that stack well with keyword blocking: filtering out reposted listings removes recycled placeholders and slow hires, while hiding jobs you've already applied to keeps results focused on fresh opportunities. Ghost job listings are a separate problem that keyword filters won't solve on their own.
In practice, the biggest time savings come in the first week of consistent filtering. Once your blocklist reflects your actual search patterns, the daily friction of scrolling past irrelevant listings drops sharply. The hiring timeline doesn't change, but the hours spent on dead-end listings before that first offer can.
Anton writes about job search problems from firsthand experience. He builds tools to solve issues like repeated listings, irrelevant results, and inefficient filtering across job platforms.
Related Resources:
- How to Exclude Companies from LinkedIn Job Search - Block specific employers and staffing agencies across all platforms with one exclusion list.
- How to Filter Out Reposted Jobs on LinkedIn - Remove recycled and reposted listings from your search results.
- What Is a Ghost Job? How to Spot Fake Listings - 93% of HR professionals admit to posting ghost jobs. Learn to spot them.
