Candidate profiles in Ashby store a lot of helpful data in context, including interview notes, emails, texts and messages, feedback scores, and interview details. Finding the exact information you need, when you need it, can involve scrolling through a lengthy feed.

<div style={{position: "relative", paddingBottom: "56.25%", height: 0}}><iframe src="https://www.loom.com/embed/443fc71b70364081af224e5d2191e9d9" frameBorder="0" webkitallowfullscreen="true" mozallowfullscreen="true" allowFullScreen style={{position: "absolute", top: 0, left: 0, width: "100%", height: "100%"}}></iframe></div>

The new AI Candidate Assistant helps you get quick answers by typing your questions directly into the candidate profile.

![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/1920x1080/b3832d4879/candidate-assistant-1.jpeg)

## Ask AI panel
On any candidate’s profile, click the “Ask AI” sidebar. A chat window slides out, showing a handful of default prompts you can use immediately.


## Pick or type your question
Choose a built-in prompt (for example, “What are the next steps for this candidate?”) or enter your own question in plain English.

![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/1920x1080/62dd6ae3fa/candidate-assistant-2.jpeg)

## See concise answers
In the chat window, you'll get an easy-to-understand response.

## Check sources
Each bullet in a response references the exact email, note, or feedback entry where that insight was found. You can review the original context in seconds.

![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/1920x1080/a5562f69b5/candidate-assistant-3.jpeg)

## Drill down with follow-ups
Ask follow-up questions that are context-aware like “What are the competing offer details?” and the assistant will surface compensation info drawn straight from interview notes.

## Maintain conversation context
Each profile’s chat history stays attached to that candidate. Switching between profiles instantly recalls the right thread, so you never lose your place.

No more guesswork, scrolling through updates, or context-switching needed to move candidates through your pipelines. Now available to every Ashby customer.



The new AI Candidate Assistant helps you get quick answers by typing your questions directly into the candidate profile.


Quickly find candidate information with AI Candidate Assistant

AI Candidate Assistant

<div style={{position: "relative", paddingBottom: "56.25%", height: 0}}><iframe src="https://www.loom.com/embed/18f6b7e6f60142a4acbf40d2804cc2ea" frameBorder="0" webkitallowfullscreen="true" mozallowfullscreen="true" allowFullScreen style={{position: "absolute", top: 0, left: 0, width: "100%", height: "100%"}}></iframe></div>
Ashby reports are powerful and flexible, but building the right one can take time. 
The redesigned [Report Builder](/product-updates/simplified-report-builder) comes with a new AI-powered Reporting Assistant, available in beta.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/1920x1080/78225af571/reporting-assistant-1.jpeg)
Instead of selecting templates or manually applying filters, you can now describe what you want in plain English in a chat with your Reporting Assistant. Ashby returns a working report with filters, fields, and visualizations already applied.

This helps teams move quickly, reduce friction, and explore their data without needing deep experience with report logic.
### Natural Language Queries
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/1920x1080/fff6e7a9bf/reporting-assistant-2.jpeg)
Instead of choosing from templates or navigating complex report types, you can now describe what you want in plain English and get started instantly. Just type something like:


> “Hires in the last six months by source.”

Ashby will instantly generate a report with the right fields, filters, and visualizations. From there, you can refine filters, adjust groupings, or ask follow-up questions to iterate further.
### Lower learning curve
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/1920x1080/85ef0a82fb/reporting-assistant-3.jpeg)

Even when the initial result isn’t perfect, the assistant gets you close. Fine-tuning your results is much easier than building the right report from scratch. Iterating in natural language helps you learn report-building techniques and uncover insights you might not have considered.

![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/1920x1080/15de5bc69d/reporting-assistant-4.jpeg)
### Under the hood

In the background, the assistant picks the best report type, applies your requested filters and grouping, and titles the report for clarity. If your query is outside its scope, it will let you know so you can adjust your request.

Combining the new report builder with AI chat unlocks a faster, more intuitive reporting experience. It’s perfect for teams that want to explore data without mastering report logic.



AI-Assisted Report Builder adds a new way to generate reports within the redesigned Report Builder. 

Build reports by asking questions in plain English

AI-Assisted Report Builder

Reporting in Ashby gives you a lot of flexibility and power. But for new users or anyone trying to move quickly, getting started can feel like a big lift. We've made it simpler for anyone to get started with Report Builder.
<div style={{position: "relative", paddingBottom: "56.25%", height: 0}}><iframe src="https://www.loom.com/embed/f16ad820decf41a9ba0528016759772b" frameBorder="0" webkitallowfullscreen="true" mozallowfullscreen="true" allowFullScreen style={{position: "absolute", top: 0, left: 0, width: "100%", height: "100%"}}></iframe></div> 

### A simpler place to start
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/3840x2160/178578683b/report-builder-1.jpeg)
The redesigned Report Builder solves this by giving you a cleaner, more focused starting point.




- Report Templates are better organized along the left sidebar
- Each template category is collapsible, allowing you to focus on a single category or explore them all
- You can easily search templates by a single keyword or topic
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/3840x2160/7c2d67b3f1/report-builder-2.jpeg)

Once you’ve selected your Report Template, we’ve made it much easier to tweak settings to get exactly what you need. 

- Your data visualization is always front and center. With live previews, you get to see the impact of your changes in real time. 
- Quickly configure your report from the tiles above your graph. For many users, these are the only adjustments needed.
- More advanced settings are available in your right sidebar, which is collapsed by default.

### Advanced settings moved to the side

### 
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/3840x2160/73170faf52/report-builder-3.jpeg)

You can still use advanced logic to build exactly what you need. These controls now live in a collapsible sidebar that keeps your report front and center as you work.

From the right sidebar you can update fields like:
- Reporting subject
- Visualization options
- Groupings
- Timezone Settings

This new experience moves us closer to our goal: making powerful reporting feel approachable and fast. It lowers the barrier to entry, making it easier for everyone to explore, understand, and act on their insights.


Ashby's simplified Report Builder makes powerful reporting feel approachable and fast. 


A simpler way to get started with reporting

simplified Report Builder

<div style={{position: "relative", paddingBottom: "56.25%", height: 0}}><iframe src="https://www.loom.com/embed/ebbee8f10a66441fbb9be6de654940da" frameBorder="0" webkitallowfullscreen="true" mozallowfullscreen="true" allowFullScreen style={{position: "absolute", top: 0, left: 0, width: "100%", height: "100%"}}></iframe></div>
Recruiters already text candidates; but usually from personal phones or third-party tools that are disconnected from the ATS. That creates risk, slows down collaboration, and leads to missed opportunities.

Ashby Texting is built to fix that. It brings texting into your core recruiting workflows with the benefits of being trackable, compliant, and easy to use. Whether you’re hiring for corporate, high-volume, or seasonal roles, Ashby helps your team move faster by reaching candidates where they are.

## Integrated and trackable by default

Ashby adds native SMS support directly inside the ATS. When texting is enabled for your organization, you’ll see SMS as an option anywhere you’d typically email a candidate, like interview scheduling, reminders, or sourcing outreach. 
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2312x1730/936fad0a81/new-texting-tab-on-the-candidate-profile.png)
All messages (sent or received) appear in the candidate feed alongside emails, notes, and other activity. This gives everyone on the team full visibility into every conversation, without switching tools or systems.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2312x1730/1a87800142/text-messages-appear-on-the-activity-feed.png)

## Compliant out of the box

Ashby handles consent management and 10DLC registration behind the scenes. Just request the feature in-app your admin center to get started. 
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2312x1730/cd9a1d9330/enable-texting-from-your-admin-panel.png)

You can collect SMS opt-in on your application form, or trigger a consent request before the first outbound message is sent. If a candidate hasn’t opted in, Ashby will queue the message and send it once they reply “START.” Candidates can opt out at any time by replying “STOP,” and all consent changes are automatically logged. If consent happens outside of Ashby (like during a phone call), recruiters can override it manually.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2312x1730/4182559bff/texting-consent.png)
Ashby provides a single, shared phone number per organization, so messages don’t come from random or unrecognizable numbers. This improves trust, ensures brand consistency, and reduces confusion for candidates at a time when recruiting-related scams are commonplace.

Recruiters can reply to messages from within Ashby or directly via email—whichever is faster. Notifications can be customized to alert recruiters via Slack or email when a candidate replies, opts in, or updates their consent status.

## Templates and automation so your team moves faster
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2312x1730/5e92e13ed0/build-texting-templates-with-replacement-tokens.png)
Teams can send messages manually or use Texting Templates with full Ashby token support for personalization. 

Admins can create shared templates; recruiters can manage personal ones. This saves time and ensures consistent, high-quality outreach.
SMS is also fully integrated into interview workflows. From the Schedule Interview activity, you can:

- Send Direct Booking SMS when scheduling
Send Confirmation SMS after booking
- Enable SMS-based Interview Reminders
- Automatically send texts when a candidate enters a specific stage

You can toggle any of these to use SMS or email, depending on what works best.

Note: 
This initial release is limited to support SMS based messaging to US and Canadian phone numbers. Support for WhatsApp messaging in order to text candidates with international phone numbers will come later.



Ashby brings texting into your core recruiting workflows with the benefits of being trackable, compliant, and easy to use. 


Texting in Ashby: Fast, Compliant, and Built for Recruiting

Texting in Ashby

<div style={{position: "relative", paddingBottom: "56.25%", height: 0}}><iframe src="https://www.loom.com/embed/f94bf97a17ad4519874e08286ad05f2a" frameBorder="0" webkitallowfullscreen="true" mozallowfullscreen="true" allowFullScreen style={{position: "absolute", top: 0, left: 0, width: "100%", height: "100%"}}></iframe></div> 
Faster hiring starts with tight alignment from the start. But in practice, busy schedules and unclear expectations often slow things down. 

Hiring manager expectations on ideal profiles can be implicit, feedback hard to collect, and review workflows clunky. This lack of tight alignment leaves recruiters to guess what “good” looks like, creating delays and mismatched candidates. 

Candidate Reviews in Ashby make it easy for hiring teams to quickly exchange structured feedback on candidate profiles and stay aligned all within the ATS. They give you a lightweight, structured way to get hiring manager feedback on candidate profiles quickly and easily. 

## Requesting candidate reviews

You can quickly request reviews from hiring managers using Bulk Actions in Sourcing Projects. To get started, jump into any active sourcing project and select the candidates who match your desired profile. You’ll find a new Request Review action.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2270x1416/028e09ad4f/candidate-review-1.png)
When you do this, a new dialogue screen will appear where you can enter your review request details. You’ll enter a title, select your reviewer, and provide context for the request in the optional note.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2370x1730/7f75b70989/candidate-request-review-2.png)
Once sent, you’ll be notified again when the assigned reviewer has completed their reviews.

## Review candidates easily

Hiring Managers are instantly pulled into the Candidate Review process with a one-click review request that is delivered right into their inbox. The email notification is optimized for action, which is necessary when partnering with busy Hiring Managers.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2862x2102/d445874858/4-3-start-reviews.png)
Hiring Managers will also see a new task notification waiting for them the next time they log into Ashby under a new Reviews tab. This notification makes it easy to track and complete reviews alongside their other hiring team activities.

When a hiring manager starts a review, they’ll see the candidate’s profile along with all the context the recruiter provided. This makes it easy to jump in without a lengthy handoff, or the context switching that comes when using a tool outside your ATS.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2526x2102/abb6cccdd9/start-review-zoomed-out.png)

As hiring managers review profiles, they can score candidates with an easy 1-4 scale, and input any optional notes about the profile to help TA teams better refine their sourcing strategies. The built-in scoring mechanism ensures a structured evaluation across candidates.

This setup allows hiring managers to review candidates on their own time, while giving recruiters the clear, actionable feedback they need to move fast and stay aligned.

Hiring Managers will work through each profile until they have finished reviewing all candidates. At that point they will see the same completed reviews page that you do.

Perfect for tight feedback loops, clearer collaboration, and faster iteration on sourcing strategy.

## Review feedback at a glance

With Candidate Reviews, it’s easy to tell whether your sourcing strategy is working. Candidates who received a passing score (3 or 4) are marked with a green thumbs-up icon. Those who scored 2 or below are marked with a red thumbs-down.
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2370x1730/2e5c3d3fc9/candidate-review-summary.png)
On the right side of the Reviews page, Ashby summarizes the hiring manager’s feedback across the pool of candidates you requested for review. You’ll see who reviewed the candidates, any notes they left, the average score, and the overall pass rate. Recruiters can also view the original note shared when the review was requested, giving full context to the request.

Even at high volumes, Candidate Reviews are designed to be actionable. They help you spot trends, adjust your approach, and continuously improve alignment with hiring managers.

When there’s enough review data, Ashby takes it a step further with AI-powered summaries. These summaries highlight sentiment, surface patterns in the feedback, and suggest next steps, like tightening your criteria or shifting your focus.

## A central view of all reviews
Under the Sourcing tab, Ashby customers will find a new Candidate Reviews item. Here they can see a central view of Candidate Reviews across your organization. Teams can view their sent and received requests, create targeted filtered views, and manage the status of current candidate reviews. 
![](https://a-us.storyblok.com/f/1017310/2370x1730/db3fe0deba/4-3-cr-home.png)

You can filter by reviewer, requester, title, status, and confidentiality  which makes it easy to stay organized as volume grows.


Candidate Reviews give you a lightweight, structured way to get hiring manager feedback on candidate profiles quickly and easily. 


Candidate Reviews: Enhance Collaboration Between Recruiters and Hiring Managers

Candidate Reviews

Today, we’re releasing AI-Assisted Application Review to all customers in Ashby. It’s designed to help you manage high inbound application volume and one of the biggest improvements to our customer’s productivity we’ve launched to date.

Check out a full walkthrough below:

<div style={{position: "relative", paddingBottom: "56.25%", height: 0}}><iframe src="https://www.loom.com/embed/f39e1f94c21941988c494703e25c6118" frameBorder="0" webkitallowfullscreen="true" mozallowfullscreen="true" allowFullScreen style={{position: "absolute", top: 0, left: 0, width: "100%", height: "100%"}}></iframe></div>

We know a big part of adopting new AI technology into your workflow means having the proper assurances around privacy, compliance, and safeguards to protect against candidate biases.

In this post we’ll detail how the new AI-Assisted Application Review feature works, and importantly, how Ashby helps you adopt this technology in a responsible way.

### The rise of inbound application volume

We’ve seen a number of trends contribute to the influx of inbound applications over the last few years:

![inbound application volume](/images/01-applications-per-job-by-job-type-updated-jan-24-v2-2x.png)

* Macro factors leading to more applicants on the market with longer job searches
* Remote work taking hold creating bigger pools of talent for each job
* The proliferation of technology that makes it easier for candidates to apply

Talent teams have the tough job of managing high volume inbound channels while delivering on candidate experience and still carving out time for high touch recruiting activities.

Your team may be asking questions like: How do we prevent application review from being a huge time sink? How can we surface promising applicants and quickly get back to them? How can our team spend more time on high-value hiring activities?

The new AI-Assisted Application Review feature offers a step change in efficiency for reviewing applications while responsibly using the latest advancements in AI.

> We receive a high volume of inbound applications, and our team was spending significant time managing the initial review process. The AI-Assisted Application Review feature from Ashby has been valuable in helping us efficiently sort through this influx. It allows us to quickly flag candidates who meet our key skill requirements while still maintaining a human-centered approach to final evaluations. - Hootan Altafi, Head of Talent Operations, Dandy

Read on to see how it works.

### How AI-Assisted Application Review works in Ashby

In your Job settings you now have the option to define criteria that’s used by the integrated AI model to analyze applicant resumes.

![setting criteria for AI assisted application review](/images/02-defining-criteria.png)

This allows you to document criteria directly in the ATS and introduces a new level of objectivity and consistency for your reviewers.

Applicants are evaluated against each of the criteria you've defined. Under the hood, when you run these application reviews, the AI is parsing through each resume, trying to find evidence as to whether the candidate "Meets" or "Does not Meet" the criteria you’ve defined. Once complete, the AI returns the best determination, along with rationale for how the determination was made.

![candidate list with criteria](/images/03-candidate-list.png)

You can then filter and segment your application review based on any specific combination of criteria you define. This offers a marked efficiency improvement to your application review process.

![filtering candidates](/images/04-filtering-by-criteria.png)

By structuring and segmenting applicants based on criteria they match, you immediately start to recognize time-savings. You can:

* Review applicants that meet all your must-have criteria first and get back to them quicker
* Verify and reject candidates that meet few or none of your criteria
* Construct a dynamic set of filters in a few clicks to suit your own approach 

When you’re reviewing applications you’ll always see the AI output along with citations for how the determination was made.

![ai citations in output](/images/05-citations-in-evaluation.png)

Then, it is up to the reviewer to advance or reject. 

Using this segmented approach means you’re no longer guessing what type of resume is coming next during your review. Not knowing what type of resume you’re evaluating with each new application is often what leads to the "time sink" during manual review.

By grouping similar applications (based on criteria you set) you stay in context during the review of each batch. 

This is what enables you to review efficiently across a large volume of applicants.  VP of Talent at Ashby, Jim Miller, details how this approach [helped him review 1500 applications in 6 hours](https://www.ashbyhq.com/blog/recruiting/ai-assisted-application-review-in-practice).

### How Ashby helps you responsibly adopt AI technology

It’s not enough to just build an AI-powered feature that helps with productivity. We spent a significant amount of our product development addressing the various implications of using AI in this part of your hiring process. Here are the ways we’re helping you responsibly integrate AI technology into your workflows.

#### Proactive Monitoring and Compliance with AI Legislation

The AI legislative landscape is rapidly evolving. Recently, we’ve seen NY Local Law 144 take effect with Colorado SB 24-205, Illinois HB3773 and the EU AI Act slated for enforcement in 2026.

We’re tracking these requirements and have already taken measures to ensure your team is set up for compliance with these regulations. This includes:

* A bias audit conducted by an independent third-party. We’ve contracted Fairnow to support both audit and AI model inventory requirements.
* DPAs and other contractual measures in place with sub-processors to ensure customer data is not used by them to train models.
* Flexible support for configuring applicant disclosures, including the ability for applicants to opt-out of AI processing.

As these regulations continue to evolve so too will AI in Ashby to stay at the forefront of compliance.

#### Taking Multiple Steps to Avoid Bias

We’ve built into the product several features to help protect against bias, both implicit and explicit. This includes in-app warnings around specificity and best practices for prompting,

![guideline for criteria](/images/06-guideline-warnings-vague.jpeg)

as well as more direct warnings around potential Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) violations.

![EEO warning](/images/07-guideline-errors-eeo.jpeg)

Additionally, before resumes are sent to AI models for processing, we redact PII to avoid the possibility of bias being introduced from model training data.

We’ve also made our third-party bias audit results publicly available here: [Bias Audit for Ashby’s Criteria Evaluation Model](https://www.ashbyhq.com/downloadables/ashby-bias-audit-08-2024.pdf).

Removing the potential for bias to support an even playing field is a priority and we’ll continue to invest here while employing proactive product thinking. 

**Clarity and Transparency Around AI Model Outputs**

Like other AI features in Ashby, you can view the citations of source material next to the analysis. These citations make understanding the AI evaluations transparent. No black box.

![more detailed citations](/images/08-double-click-transparency.jpeg)

In cases where you see an AI output that you don’t agree with, you can flag, report, and override the analysis. This gives you fine-grained control over outputs and ensures you’re not compromising important parts of your review process. 

![flag-ai-evals](/images/09-flag-evals.png)

You’ll also notice some criteria may be marked as skipped or unknown.

![undecided examples](/images/10-undecided-example.jpeg)

If the AI can't make a determination, the criteria evaluation will be marked as unknown. If the resume is unreadable, the criteria will be marked as skipped in the output.

#### Empowering Talent Teams

Our approach takes an optimistic view on AI’s ability to enhance the productivity of talent teams, while increasing fairness and transparency for candidates. 

While AI surfaces key information to support decision-making, it’s ultimately the qualified humans on your team making an advance/reject decision. Fundamentally, the technology is **assistive** in nature and designed to expand your team’s capacity - not replace it.

### Getting Started

This feature is available on all plans, with a baseline number of credits included in each plan. Incremental usage credits are available to purchase based on your company's application volume.

To get started with AI-Assisted Application Review head over to the “Opt-in Features” section in your organization’s admin settings to enable the feature. See the full setup guide over at [Ashby University](https://ashbyhq.notion.site/617bc3a1c4e143e091c599342ced1b2c).  If you’re interested in trying out Ashby and the new AI-Assisted Application Review you can also [Book a demo](https://www.ashbyhq.com/request-demo) to learn more.

Define criteria for your jobs and use AI to analyze matches across inbound applications.

Manage inbound application volume with AI-Assisted Application Review

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Quickly find candidate information with AI Candidate Assistant

Build reports by asking questions in plain English

A simpler way to get started with reporting

Texting in Ashby: Fast, Compliant, and Built for Recruiting

Candidate Reviews: Enhance Collaboration Between Recruiters and Hiring Managers

Manage inbound application volume with AI-Assisted Application Review

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