You should not memorize, but understand. An opening repertoire grows slowly but steady over the years. You start with your mains and stick to them because you know them so well. Then sometimes they need a repair, and you learn a backup.
I have two serious White opening moves: 1.d4 (main) and 1.c4 (solid). After 1.d4 d5 I play 2.c4 (main now) or 2.Nf3 (old main). After 1.d4 Nf6 I mainly play 2.Bg5 or 2.Nf3.
Sometimes I also play 1.e4 and 1.f4 (or 1.b3) for fun, so I have a small repertoire here as well.
Against 1.e4 I play 1...c6 (main) or 1...Nf6. My main weapon against 1.d4 (and 1.c4 or 1.Nf3) is 1...f5, but sometimes I play 1...Nf6 and after 2.c4 I can play 2...c5, 2...e6 or 2..d5.
We've all heard that beginners should stick to the same openings. Also as adult improvers, we have limited time for chess study, learning new openings could be too painful for some of us.
But we all want to be cool like top GMs who can switch between e4 and d5 or even a4! with ease.lol.
Do you usually play more than one opening each for white and black (against 1d4 and e4)? How well do you know the theory of those openings?
For me, I play 1d4 as white; generally Queen's Gambit if black allows it, but also face lots of KID, Benoni and other offbeat openings that black can choose.
As black, when face against 1e4 I play Caro-Kann, and against 1d4 I play Benko Gambit.
I feel like I still can't memorize all of the lines in those openings especially the sideline ones. So learning new openings seems like it would be too much for me to handle, even though I might one day.