When you’re getting your foot in the door, job applications are mostly a numbers game - especially with how many postings are completely bogus (job doesn’t exist, or is already going to an internal hire). MOST of the time I think the cover letter either gets a brief glance or doesn’t get read at all.

If you’ve got to churn out as many job applications as possible just to get an interview with a real company, you’ll go insane if you try to make them all thoughtful, beautiful, and crafted to the specific job posting. Worse: you’ll churn out fewer applications. The job application with a cover letter like weak tea is infinitely better than the job application that you never submit because you’re paralyzed by the need to write something perfect. I had a standard template that I modified slightly for each application, but I kept the time customizing it very low: swapping out a list of skills to highlight, etc.

That being said: after talking to my boss recently, apparently my cover letter helped when I was applying to this job (I’m enthusiastic about this area, so I put in some extra time and let my water nerd show). I think what I said is still probably valid for most junior developer positions, but your mileage may vary.