Gender disparities in top-level academic positions are persistent. However, whether bias in recruitment plays a role in producing these disparities remains unclear. This study examines the role of biasin academic recruitment by conducting a large-scale survey experiment among faculty in Economics,Law, Physics, Political Science, Psychology, and Sociology from universities in Iceland, Norway, andSweden. The faculty respondents rated CVs of hypothetical candidates—who were randomlyassigned either a male or a female name—for a permanent position as an Associate Professor in theirdiscipline. The results show that, despite the underrepresentation of women in all fields, the femalecandidates were viewed as both more competent and more hireable compared to their malecounterparts. Having children or a stronger CV do not change the overall result. Consequently, biasedevaluations of equally qualified candidates to Associate Professor positions do not seem to be the keyexplanation of the persistent gender gap in academia in the Nordic region.