Tailoring every CV from scratch is unrealistic for most job seekers, but sending an identical CV to every posting also limits your results. The most effective approach sits in between.
Build one strong "master CV" containing all of your experience, achievements, and skills. For each application, create a tailored version by selecting the most relevant bullet points, adjusting your professional summary, and reordering skills to match the specific posting.
Focus your tailoring energy on the top third of the CV — the summary and the first role listed — since this is what reviewers see first and where alignment matters most.
Keeping a master CV also saves significant time over a long job search, since you are rearranging and lightly editing existing content rather than starting from a blank page for every single application.