30 Interesting Facts About Yourself Examples (to Stand Out)

How do you answer tell me an interesting fact about yourself?

The main rules when sharing interesting facts about yourself in an interview is to make sure the facts are:

• Appropriate for a professional environment,
• Truthful,
• Something you can elaborate on, and
• Relate to a soft skill (examples: leadership, teamwork, persistence, or communication) or hard skill (examples: spoken languages, computer languages, SEO, or fast typing) specific to the job you are interviewing for 

For example, if you’re interviewing for a design job and happen to be an art fanatic you could tell the interviewer, “When I’m not working my hobby is to attend art shows.” As a designer the soft skills that you would exhibit by sharing that you attend art shows are: curiosity, continuous learning, and industry networking.  

To build rapport and lighten the mood the interviewer may ask follow-up questions to the interesting fact that you share. Using our example, the interviewer may follow-up and ask questions such as “How often do you go to art shows?” or “What’s been your favorite art show in the last six months?”

Only share interesting facts about yourself that you can elaborate on otherwise you may end up in a situation where the interviewer asks you questions you should be able to answer but can’t because the interesting fact isn’t truthful. This would discredit you and set a negative tone for your interview.

To help you brainstorm facts to share in an interview below are 30 examples to draw inspiration from. Go ahead, scroll through the examples to pull inspiration that help you create interesting facts about yourself that wow the interviewer!

30 Interesting Facts About Yourself Examples

The interesting facts you share with the interviewer will depend on your passions and industry. To help you get inspired below are interesting facts that can be used by people interviewing for a variety of roles and industries.

30 interesting facts about yourself examples:

1. My cat is named Da Vinci after one of the people in history I admire most for their forward thinking and innovation. 
2. As for hobbies outside of work, I like to build things with LEGO. On occasion, I am commissioned to build large company logos for corporate events.
3. I love learning new technologies. I contribute to a number of open source projects.
4. My favorite event is RuPaul’s Drag Race because it always has interesting people from all walks of life and the styling is creative.
5. One of my goals this year was to run a half marathon and I did it!
6. My favorite podcast is scigest, it’s all about plant and food research. 
7. I have a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from UC Davis and graduated in three years instead of four. 
8. I love to scuba dive and have a list of 63 unique sea animals I’ve come across.
9. I love reading. It is one of my favorite hobbies and something I do for fun. This year I’ve read 234 books.
10. I am very interested in learning new languages. I speak four: English, Spanish, Portuguese and French and am currently working on learning Italian and Arabic.
11. I am a big fan of traveling and have been to over 20 countries. Some highlights include Machu Picchu, the Great Wall of China, and the Taj Mahal.
12. I am on the Board of Directors of a nonprofit called Code for Fun which is dedicated to teaching kids how to code through after-school programs and summer camps.
13. I’ve been married for 5 years and have an almost 2-year-old daughter who is deaf. My wife and I have enjoyed learning American Sign Language to communicate with our daughter.
14. I was born in a small town in Maine that only had a population of about 500 people. In the town everyone was friendly and would wave and say “hi.” When I moved to Los Angeles it was a culture shock. Here I learned you can’t just wave and say “hi” on the street or people think you’re creepy. You can however smile and wave “hi” at work. In my exit interview at my last position I was told they were going to miss the personal warmness I brought to the office. 
15. I’m an avid hiker and have climbed mountains in several different countries.
16. I lived in Spain for two years while teaching English as a second language.
17. I’m an amateur ballroom dancer. I started competing a few years ago and have competed in city, county, state, and East Coast competitions. I just missed the bronze to go to nationals by .73 of a point. This year I’m ready, and hoping, to make it to nationals.  
18. A year ago, I organized a 5k walk/run event in my condos that raised over $10,000 for the local food bank. The community had so much fun that they said they would set a goal of raising $25,000 for the food bank if I organized the event again, so I am!
19. While studying abroad in college, I decided to take a cooking class and learn to make Mexican food. It opened my eyes to the culinary arts. Now I find cooking to be how I relax at the end of a day. No matter what type of day I’ve had I always feel relaxed after time in the kitchen. 
20. I’m an avid traveler and have visited over 28 countries around the world. 
21. I love playing sports and volunteer as a basketball coach for at-risk youth at the YMCA.
22. When I was growing up my family would do community service each weekend for several years which taught me how important it is to help others. It’s a habit I continue to practice and have used to help build positive relations between the companies I work for and the community.
23. I interned for a company that got hacked. It is what prompted me to pivot my career from accounting to cyber-security.
24. I’m really into fitness and used to compete in bodybuilding competitions.
25. I’ve been playing the violin for over 22 years and once had the honor of playing for the Pope during the holiday season.
26. Even though I’m shy and introverted, I’ve excelled at public speaking. I am the West Coast Toastmaster Champion and have spoken to groups as large as 10,000.
27. I’m very into health and fitness and have published a few articles about health topics on Forbes.
28. The biggest challenge I overcame in life was losing 50 lbs in 10 months because it took me out of my comfort zone by constantly pushing myself to try new activities like boxing, hiking, and crossfit.
29. I’m a big fan of personal finance and have been managing my own finances since the age of 10. I’ve been successfully investing in stocks for more than 20 years now!
30. When I was a little girl I was a dancer not a Girl Scout. I was jealous that they got awards, patches, and other things for selling cookies. So I decided to sell snacks at my dance rehearsals. I ended up making almost $600.00 in profit over a few weekends. When I told my Girl Scout friends they were mad because they didn’t make money, they only got awards and “stuff”. It was at the age of eight that I first realized not doing what everyone else is doing pays off. 

There are plenty of interesting facts about yourself that can be shared in an interview beyond these 30 interview examples. The key is to create interesting and unique personal facts that the interviewer will remember.

Interesting Facts About Yourself (FAQs)

Conclusion

Standing out in a sea of job applicants can be difficult. An easy way to become a memorable candidate is to share a fun fact about yourself. I hope the 30 Interesting Facts About Yourself Examples, tips, and FAQS, have provided you with inspiration to create your own interesting facts about yourself for a job interview.

Remember, the more unique and genuine your interesting facts are, the more likely the interviewer is to remember you when they are making the final hiring decision!

What interesting facts about yourself did you come up with? Share in the comments!

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