How to Expertly Fill Out the ERAS Experiences Section

The ERAS (Electronic Residency Application Service) Experiences Section is an opportunity to show residency programs who you are beyond your grades, scores, and clinical evaluations. When completed strategically, this section helps residency programs understand who you are as an applicant, what you value, and the qualities you would bring to their team.

For the current ERAS cycle, applicants can include up to 10 selected experiences and identify up to 3 as their “most meaningful.” These sections are designed to give residency programs a clearer picture of each applicant’s values, motivations, and personal journey as they decide who to invite for residency interviews.

According to the AAMC’s 2026 Program Director Survey, more than 94% of program director respondents used applicants’ most meaningful experiences when deciding on interview invitations. About 70% of respondents reported using the selected experiences section as part of a mission-aligned application review process.

At MedSchoolCoach, we’ve helped hundreds of medical students successfully navigate the residency application process. Below, we break down each part of the section and share our expert tips to help you stand out as you transition from medical school into residency.

Download our 10 ERAS Experiences Guidebook to hear top tips from our Physician Advisors. Learn how to choose the 10 best experiences for your specialty and craft descriptions that impress.

The Selected Experiences Section

The ERAS Experiences Section has two main parts: Selected Experiences and Most Meaningful Experiences. Both allow you to highlight your accomplishments while giving programs insight into what has shaped you on your journey to becoming a physician.

Selected Experiences

The Selected Experiences section allows you to identify and describe up to 10 experiences that communicate who you are and what matters most to you. Sometimes referred to as the ERAS activities section, this part of the application gives residency programs insight into your background, interests, and qualities you’d bring to their program.

For each experience, you’ll provide information like:

• Position title
• Organization name
• Start and end dates
• Frequency of participation
• Location and setting
• Experience type
• Primary focus area (when applicable)
• Key characteristic (when applicable)
• Description of the experience (750-character limit)

The goal is to think strategically about which experiences best represent your strengths, interests, and the qualities you would bring to a residency program.

Most Meaningful Experiences

Out of the 10 experiences, ERAS will ask you to choose your three most meaningful experiences. For each one, you’ll have an additional 300 characters to explain why that experience was significant and how it influenced you.

Programs are looking for applicants who can demonstrate self-awareness and growth. Your most meaningful experience descriptions should help answer why these experiences matter and how they influenced you.

If you selected a primary focus area and key characteristics for the most meaningful experience, use your reflection to explain why that designation applies.

Experience Types

Experience types are categories used to help residency programs better understand the activities you include in your ERAS Experiences Section. While some experiences may fit into more than one category, you must select the single type that best describes each experience.

You can choose from the following experience types:

• Education/training: Includes clinical training experiences such as clerkships, away rotations, subinternships, and structured observerships.
• Military service: Includes experiences related to military training, service, or roles held within a military organization.
• Professional organization: Includes societies, associations, and organizations at the local, regional, national, or international levels.
• Other extracurricular activity, club, or hobby: Includes activities like sports, music, theater, student government, and other long-term interests.
• Research: Includes scientific, clinical, or other scholarly research experiences.
• Teaching/mentoring: Includes paid teaching positions, teaching assistant roles, and tutoring experiences.
• Volunteer/service/advocacy: Includes unpaid experiences focused on service, community involvement, or advocacy.
• Work: Includes paid clinical, nonclinical, business, or entrepreneurial work experience.
  
  

Primary Focus Area

The primary focus area helps residency programs better understand the purpose and impact of each experience. This is optional, but I recommend using it when it clearly applies to your experience. Although an experience may relate to multiple focus areas, you can select only one primary focus area for each entry.

Here are the primary focus areas you can choose from:

• Basic science
• Clinical/translational science
• Community involvement/outreach
• Customer service
• Health care administration
• Improving access to health care
• Medical education
• Music/athletics/art
• Promoting wellness
• Public health
• Quality improvement
• Social justice/advocacy
• Technology
  
  

Hobbies and Interests

The Hobbies and Interests section gives applicants an additional opportunity to share who they are outside of their academic and clinical achievements.

You have up to 300 characters to describe your hobbies and interests. While this section is optional, meaningful long-term interests can help residency programs better understand your personality, what you’re passionate about, and the qualities you’d bring to a residency team.

A genuine interest, like playing an instrument, sports, or volunteering in your community, can help provide a more complete picture of who you are. Think of this section as another opportunity to add context to your MyERAS application.

Frequency

The frequency field helps residency programs understand how often you participated in each experience. It’s okay if your experience only occurred once. It can still be meaningful if it demonstrates your growth, interests, or contributions.

When completing this section, choose the frequency that most accurately reflects your involvement during the time frame listed for the experience.

Frequency options include:

• One time (not recurring): A single event or experience that did not continue over time (for example, a conference presentation, medical mission trip, or one-time volunteer event).
• Daily (recurring): More than two days per week during the time frame noted (for example, a full-time research position)
• Weekly (recurring): One or two days per week (for example, volunteering at a free clinic each week)
• Monthly (recurring): Once or twice per month (for example, volunteering at a community health organization one weekend each month).
• Quarterly (recurring): Three or four times per year (for example, attending quarterly organizational events).
• Annually (recurring): Once per year (for example, participating in an annual fundraising event or community outreach program).
  
  

Key Characteristics

The key characteristics section allows you to highlight the most important quality you developed or demonstrated through each experience. While more than one may apply, you should choose the single characteristic that best represents what you gained from or contributed to that activity.

You can leave it blank, but I always recommend picking one. It’s a great way to self-reflect and think about what these experiences say about you as a future physician.

Below are the key characteristics you’ll have to choose from:

• Communication
• Critical thinking and problem-solving
• Cultural humility and awareness
• Empathy and compassion
• Ethical responsibility
• Ingenuity and innovation
• Reliability and dependability
• Resilience and adaptability
• Self-reflection and improvement
• Teamwork and leadership

Quick note: The ERAS key characteristics are similar to the broader competencies residency programs look for in physicians, but they are not the same as formal competency frameworks.

Learn More: Categorical vs Preliminary vs Advanced Residency Programs Explained

Expert Tips

The ERAS Experiences Section is one of the best opportunities you have to help residency programs really understand you. Over the years, I’ve reviewed hundreds of residency applications and worked with medical students throughout the ERAS and Match process.

A common mistake I see is that applicants focus too much on what they did and not enough on why those experiences mattered. Below, I share the top tips I give students for creating an ERAS Experiences Section that is thoughtful, authentic, and memorable.

Write Unique, Strong Descriptions

Learning how to write ERAS experiences effectively starts with understanding what program directors are looking for. The description is one of the most important parts of the ERAS Experiences Section. Give yourself plenty of time to develop each one.

Try to answer the who, what, when, where, why, and how for each experience. The basic information fields will already provide the who, where, and when, so use your 750-character description to focus on:

• What: Describe your responsibilities, accomplishments, contributions, and what you learned from the experience.
• Why: Explain why you pursued this experience and why it was meaningful to your development as a future physician.
• How: Show how the experience helped you develop important qualities, skills, or perspectives that residency programs value.

Remember that you have only 750 characters, not words, and that includes spaces and punctuation. Every sentence should add value.

Write Impactful “Most Meaningful Experiences”

After choosing your 10 experiences, you can pick up to 3 as your “most meaningful.” You get an additional 300 characters to explain why each of these is such an impactful experience.

Use this space for reflection. Describe how each experience influenced you to be a stronger candidate for residency. Program directors are looking for descriptions that show overcoming adversity, introspection, and clear growth.

If you listed a key characteristic or primary focus area under a most meaningful experience, your reflection should help explain why that characteristic or focus area applies.

Be Authentic

Residency programs don’t want just one type of applicant. They’re looking for a diverse range of candidates. Be true to yourself, and don’t make up or exaggerate experiences you think they want to hear.

Your experiences don’t need to be exclusively medical, either. A long-term commitment to music, athletics, community service, or another passion can reveal important qualities about you as an applicant. The key is explaining why that experience makes you a great candidate for a residency program.

Start Early and Proofread Carefully

Don’t wait until the last minute to complete your Experiences Section. Strong descriptions require time for reflection, drafting, and revision. Give yourself 4-6 weeks to brainstorm which experiences to include, how best to describe them, and which are your “most meaningful.”

Then proofread carefully before submitting. Typos and grammatical errors can distract from your accomplishments and may raise questions about your attention to detail and professionalism.

Ask trusted people like mentors, advisors, peers, or faculty members to review your descriptions and provide feedback. A fresh perspective can help identify areas where your experiences could be clearer or more impactful.

Expert Tip: The ERAS timeline can move quickly, so planning ahead can help you avoid rushing important parts of your application. This is especially important for pieces that depend on other people, such as letters of recommendation. You should give your letter of recommendation (LOR) writers plenty of notice. Send polite reminders if needed to help keep the process moving.

Prioritize Relevant Work

Your number-one priority is persuading the residency director that you are a good fit for the program. Prioritize experiences that best support your application and demonstrate the qualities you want programs to recognize.

Clinical experiences, research, volunteer work, leadership roles, and other activities may all be valuable additions. The right balance depends on your individual journey and the programs you are targeting.

For example, if a program emphasizes community service and advocacy, highlight experiences that demonstrate your commitment to those areas. More selective programs may be strongly research-focused. For those, make sure your research experiences are represented clearly.

Think of the Experiences Section as one piece of your overall ERAS application. Use it to complement your personal statement, letters of recommendation, program signaling, and other application materials while providing additional insight into who you are and your goals.

Craft your ERAS personal statement with the help of a professional writer and a Physician Advisor with admissions committee experience. No limits on messaging, hours, or edits.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Even strong applicants can make their ERAS application less competitive by making avoidable mistakes in the Experiences Section. Keep these in mind as you complete your application.

Don’t Repeat Yourself

If you can help it, don't repeat what you've already included elsewhere in your ERAS application, such as your personal statement, letters of recommendation, or MSPE. Use the Experiences Section to complement the rest of your application by providing additional insight into your strengths as a residency candidate.

Some overlap is inevitable, especially if an experience played a significant role in your journey, but each section of your application should add something new.

Your 300-character Most Meaningful Experiences reflections in particular shouldn’t just restate the information from your 750-character experience description. Instead, use this space to explain why the experience mattered.

Don’t Leave Anything Blank

Don’t leave optional fields blank if you can help it. Take advantage of every opportunity to provide meaningful information about your experiences. If a primary focus area or key characteristic applies to an experience, include it to give residency programs additional context.

Also, make the most of the 10 available experience slots. Although the quality of your descriptions is more important than the quantity of experiences you include, a strong residency application should take advantage of the space available to showcase meaningful activities, accomplishments, and commitments.

Competition for residency positions is fierce, and successful applicants use every part of their ERAS application to strengthen their candidacy. You do not need to include an experience simply to reach the maximum number, but leaving out meaningful experiences can prevent programs from getting a complete picture of who you are as an applicant.

Don’t Write Generic Descriptions

Avoid treating your experience descriptions like a resume. You want to tell program directors why these experiences matter.

Describe your specific contributions, accomplishments, lessons learned, and how the experience helped shape you as a candidate. Strong descriptions provide context, demonstrate growth, and help programs understand the value you would bring to their residency.

Don’t Use Special Formatting

The ERAS application does not support rich text formatting, so paragraph breaks, indentations, bullet points, and other formatting may not transfer correctly when you enter your responses.

Instead, write concise sentences in a single paragraph to avoid formatting errors. I recommend drafting your descriptions and Most Meaningful Experiences responses in a basic text editor (such as TextEdit on a Mac or Notepad on a PC) rather than Microsoft Word or Google Docs, which may introduce hidden formatting.

Should You Answer the Impactful Experiences Question?

The Impactful Experiences section gives residency applicants an opportunity to share significant challenges or obstacles that influenced their journey to residency.

Unlike the other sections of ERAS, these experiences don’t need to be related to medicine. They can come from any point in your life, and should provide additional context about your background or personal journey that isn’t already captured elsewhere in your application. This applies to both U.S. medical graduates and international medical graduates (IMGs).

This section is optional, and not every applicant will have an experience that applies. In the most recent report, 56% of residency applicants responded to the Impactful Experiences question. Programs understand that some applicants may not have relevant experiences to share, while others may prefer not to disclose personal information in their application.

If you have overcome a significant challenge and feel comfortable sharing that experience, this section can help residency programs better understand your path to medicine. However, this is not a place to include everyday difficulties or minor setbacks.

When deciding whether to answer the Impactful Experiences question, consider whether you have experienced challenges related to areas such as:

• Family background: Has your family situation had a meaningful impact on your journey to becoming a physician? This could include experiences such as losing a family member, serving as a caregiver while pursuing your education, navigating a major family transition, or being the first person in your family to graduate from college.
• Financial background: Have you experienced substantial financial challenges while pursuing your education, including undergraduate or medical school? If so, consider how those circumstances affected your journey and what you did to overcome those barriers.
• Community setting: Did you grow up in a community setting that created significant obstacles to your success? The AAMC notes that circumstances such as food insecurity, poverty, crime, or limited access to healthcare may be relevant examples. Consider how your environment influenced your experiences, opportunities, or path toward medicine.
• Educational experiences: Did you encounter limited opportunities to access mentors, advisors, educational resources, or other support systems that could have helped you succeed? If so, explain what resources were unavailable to you, how you navigated those challenges, and how they influenced your path to becoming a physician.
• Other significant life circumstances: Have you experienced any other major life event or personal challenge that significantly influenced your journey? Consider how that experience shaped your resilience, perspective, goals, or approach to medicine.

If you choose to answer this section, focus on reflection rather than simply describing what happened. The Impactful Experiences section is not about proving that you have faced hardship. It’s about providing context. Only include experiences that are meaningful, authentic, and genuinely shaped your journey.

FAQs

Increase Your Chances of Matching Into Your Dream Residency

With thousands of applicants participating in the NRMP Match each year, a strategic residency application is essential to helping programs understand your strengths, experiences, and goals. You’ve worked hard to get to this point, and now it’s time to make sure your application accurately reflects the qualities and accomplishments that make you a strong candidate.

Understanding every step of the Match process, including options available if you don’t initially match through the NRMP, can help you feel more confident throughout your residency journey. And you don’t need to do it alone. Working with an experienced advisor can help you strengthen your ERAS application strategy, prepare for key milestones, and take the next steps.

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