Today’s society is obsessed with success and achievement, and yet Failure is invariably avoided and feared. We fret about it, try to avoid it, and question ourselves every time we have unconventional ideas. You will inevitably experience failure in the pursuit of success. You will probably fail more times than you will succeed. But through the lows, you’ll find the highs. You have to keep trying. Your chance is waiting, and it’s closer than you think, so don’t give up!

We need to learn from our failures and not quit because of them. There is a saying that doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result is the definition of madness. By recognizing the items, we do wrong and acknowledging our failures. We can achieve success.

As a result, We have collated 130 inspirational and powerful quotes about failure to emphasize that failure is a necessary stepping stone to achieving success that will hopefully inspire you to look at loss differently.

130 Inspiring Quotes About Failure

Top 10 Failure Quotes

“A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.” – Albert Einstein

“An inventor fails 999 times, and if he succeeds once, he’s in. He treats his failures simply as practice shots.” – Charles F. Kettering

“Do the one thing you think you cannot do. Fail at it. Try again. Do better the second time. The only people who never tumble are those who never mount the high wire.” – Oprah Winfrey

“Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising every time we fail.” – Confucius

“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.” – Maya Angelou

“It’s fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.” – Bill Gates

“Every failure is a step to success.” – William Whewell

“Success is not built on success. It’s built on failure. It’s built on frustration. Sometimes its built on catastrophe.” – Sumner Redstone

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.” – Calvin Coolidge

“A failure is not always a mistake, it may simply be the best one can do under the circumstances. The real mistake is to stop trying.” – B. F. Skinner

What is Failure?

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“Failure is good as long as it doesn’t become a habit.” – Michael Eisner

“Failure is another stepping stone to greatness.” – Oprah Winfrey

“Failure is a part of the process. You just learn to pick yourself back up.” – Michelle Obama

“Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.” – Truman Capote

“Failure is success in progress.” – Albert Einstein

“Failure is so important. We speak about success all the time. It is the ability to resist failure or use failure that often leads to greater success. I’ve met people who don’t want to try for fear of failing.” – J.K. Rowling

“Failure is a feeling long before it becomes an actual result. It’s vulnerability that breeds with self-doubt and then is escalated, often deliberately, by fear.” – Michelle Obama

“Failure is the key to success; each mistake teaches us something.” – Morihei Ueshiba

“Failure isn’t fatal, but failure to change might be.” – John Wooden

“Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of yourself.” – Charlie Chaplin

“Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.” – Henry Ford

“Failure is only the opportunity more intelligently to begin again.” – Henry Ford

“Failure is not falling down but refusing to get up.” – Chinese proverb

“Failure is hard. But turn those failures into learning experiences, so that you’ll look back and be happy that you failed, because you gained more knowledge from that experience. Sometimes, it’s simply an indication to change your strategy instead of giving up completely.” – Albert Rogers

“Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement.” – C.S. Lewis

“Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.” – Og Mandion

“Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.” – Denis Waitley

Best Failure Quotes

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“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent in doing nothing.” – George Bernard Shaw

“A man may fall many times, but he won’t be a failure until he says that someone pushed him.” – Elmer G. Letterman

“A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.” – John C. Maxwell

“A person who doubts himself is like a man who would enlist in the ranks of his enemies and bear arms against himself. He makes his failure certain by himself being the first person to be convinced of it.” – Alexandre Dumas

“Always aim high, work hard, and care deeply about what you believe in. And, when you stumble, keep faith. And, when you’re knocked down, get right back up and never listen to anyone who says you can’t or shouldn’t go on.” – Hillary Clinton

“Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.” – Napoleon Hill

“Giving up is the only sure way to fail.” – Gena Showalter

“I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.” – Michael Jordan

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” – Thomas A. Edison

“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again. That is why I succeed.” – Michael Jordan

“If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” – Ken Robinson

“It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.” – J.K. Rowling

“Just because you fail once, doesn’t mean you’re gonna fail at everything. Keep trying, hold on, and always, always, always believe in yourself, because if you don’t, then who will, sweetie?” – Marilyn Monroe

“My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.” – Abraham Lincoln

“Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.” – Robert F. Kennedy

“The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.” – Mark Zuckerberg

“The difference between average people and achieving people is their perception of and response to failure.” – John C. Maxwell

“Think like a queen. A queen if not afraid to fail. Failure is another stepping stone to greatness.” – Oprah Winfrey

“You build on failure. You use it as a steppingstone. Close the door on the past. You don’t try to forget the mistakes, but you don’t dwell on it. You don’t let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.” – Johnny Cash

“You can’t let your failures define you. You have to let your failures teach you.” – Barack Obama

Inspirational Failure Quotes

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“But man is not made for defeat. A man can be destroyed but not defeated.” – Ernest Hemingway

“All people fail at certain instances in their lives, the only thing that makes them different is how they manage to stand up or how they choose to fail again.”

“Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure.” – George Edward Woodberry

“Don’t worry about failures, worry about the chances you miss when you don’t even try.” – Jack Canfield

“Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better.” – Samuel Beckett

“Failure after long perseverance is much grander than never to have a striving good enough to be called a failure.” – George Eliot

“I really think a champion is defined not by their wins but by how they can recover when they fall.” – Serena Williams

“I thank God for my failures. Maybe not at the time, but after some reflection. I never feel like a failure just because something I tried has failed.” – Dolly Parton

“I’d rather be partly great than entirely useless.” – Neal Shusterman

“It’s only when you risk failure that you discover things. When you play it safe, you’re not expressing the utmost of your human experience.” – Lupita Nyong’o

“No human ever became interesting by not failing. The more you fail and recover and improve, the better you are as a person. Ever meet someone who’s always had everything work out for them with zero struggle? They usually have the depth of a puddle. Or they don’t exist.” – Chris Hardwick

“Our greatest glory is, not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” – Oliver Goldsmith

“The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“There are no failures–just experiences and your reactions to them.” – Tom Krause

“Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” – Samuel Beckett

“What is the point of being alive if you don’t at least try to do something remarkable?” – John Green

“What would you be glad you did – even if you failed?” – Brené Brown

“When I was young, I observed that nine out of 10 things I did were failures. So I did 10 times more work.” – George Bernard Shaw

“When you take risks, you learn that there will be times when you succeed, and there will be times when you fail, and both are equally important.” – Ellen DeGeneres

Fear Of Failure Quotes

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“With a hint of good judgment, to fear nothing, not failure or suffering or even death, indicates that you value life the most. You live to the extreme; you push limits; you spend your time building legacies. Those do not die.” – Criss Jami

“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.” – Paulo Coelho

“The one who falls and gets up is stronger than the one who never tried. Do not fear failure but rather fear not trying.” – Roy T. Bennett

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.” – Elbert Hubbard

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything–all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure–these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.” – Steve Jobs

“Fear regret more than failure.” – Taryn Rose

“Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” – Jack Canfield

“Don’t fear failure—not failure, but low aim, is the crime. In great attempts it is glorious even to fail.” – Bruce Lee

“Do not fear mistakes. You will know failure. Continue to reach out.” – Benjamin Franklin

“Never walk away from failure. On the contrary, study it carefully and imaginatively for its hidden assets.” – Michael Korda

“Those who truly fail in my eyes are the ones who never try at all. The ones who sit on the couch and whine and moan and wait for the world to change for them.” – Sarah Dessen

Failure To Success Quotes

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“When it comes right down to it, I know of only one factor that separates those who consistently shine from those who don’t: The difference between average people and achieving people is their perception of and response to failure.” – John Maxwell

“It’s not how far you fall, but how high you bounce that counts.” – Zig Ziglar

“If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you always got.” – James P. Lewis

“I think you have to try and fail, because failure gets you closer to what you’re good at.” – Louis C.K.

“You always pass failure on your way to success.” – Mickey Rooney

“Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure. You’re thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn’t at all. You can be discouraged by failure or you can learn from it. So go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because remember that’s where you’ll find success. On the far side.” – Thomas John Watson, Sr.

“Winners are not afraid of losing. But losers are. Failure is part of the process of success. People who avoid failure also avoid success.” – Robert T. Kiyosaki

“We’re born with success. It is only others who point out our failures, and what they attribute to us as failure.” – Whoopi Goldberg

“We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes—understanding that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success.” – Arianna Huffington

“The only thing that separates success from failure is one last attempt. Try one more time and you will get lucky.” – Apoorve Dubey

“Successful people don’t fear failure but understand that it’s necessary to learn and grow from.” – Robert Kiyosaki

“Success or failure is caused more by mental attitude than by mental capacity.” – Walter Scott

“Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts.” – Winston Churchill

“Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” – Coco Chanel

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

“Part of being a man is learning to take responsibility for your successes and for your failures. You can’t go blaming others or being jealous. Seeing somebody else’s success as your failure is a cancerous way to live.” – Kevin Bacon

“Never let success get to your head; never let failure get to your heart.” – Anonymous

“My grandmother once told me, ‘Don`t let failure go to your heart and don’t let success go to your head.’” – Will Smith

“Most great people have achieved their greatest success just one step beyond their greatest failure.” – Napoleon Hill

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas Edison

“It’s failure that gives you the proper perspective on success.” – Ellen DeGeneres

“It’s failure that gives you the proper perspective on success.” – Ellen DeGeneres

“It is a mistake to suppose that people succeed through success; they often succeed through failures.”

“If you are afraid of failure, you don’t deserve to be successful.” – Charles Barkley

“I honestly think it is better to be a failure at something you love than to be a success at something you hate” – George Burns

“Good people are good because they’ve come to wisdom through failure. We get very little wisdom from success, you know.” – William Saroyan

“Failures, repeated failures, are finger posts on the road to achievement. One fails forward toward success.” – C. S. Lewis

“Failure is an inescapable part of life and a critically important part of any successful life.” – Tal Ben-Shahar

“Do not judge me by my successes; judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.” – Nelson Mandela

“Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.” – Dale Carnegie

“Courage allows the successful woman to fail and learn powerful lessons, from the failure. So that in the end, she didn’t fail at all.” – Maya Angelou

Failure Quotes About Life

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“There comes a time in your life, when you walk away from all the drama and people who create it. You surround yourself with people who make you laugh. Forget the bad, and focus on the good. Love the people who treat you right, pray for the ones who don’t. Life is too short to be anything but happy. Falling down is a part of life, getting back up is living.” – José N. Harris

“The secret of life is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.” – Paulo Coelho

“The only real failure in life is not to be true to the best one knows.” – Frederic William Farrar

“If you don’t try at anything, you can’t fail…it takes backbone to lead the life you want” – Richard Yates

“You’ll always miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take.” – Wayne Gretzky

“Failure happens all the time. It happens every day in practice. What makes you better is how you react to it.” – Mia Hamm

Failure Quotes For Students

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“Mistakes are the portals of discovery.” – James Joyce

“A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.” – James Joyce

“Children have a lesson adults should learn, to not be ashamed of failing, but to get up and try again. Most of us adults are so afraid, so cautious, so ‘safe,’ and therefore so shrinking and rigid and afraid that it is why so many humans fail. Most middle-aged adults have resigned themselves to failure.” – Malcolm X

“Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” – Richard Branson

“In the real world, very smart people fail, and mediocre people rise. Part of what makes people fail or succeed are skills that have nothing to do with IQ. Also, the idea that intelligence can be gauged by an IQ test is erroneous.” – Camille Paglia

“The master has failed more times than the beginner has tried.” – Stephen McCranie

“The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” – Henry Ford

“The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won’t. It’s whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.” – Barack Obama

“When we give ourselves permission to fail, we, at the same time, give ourselves permission to excel.” – Eloise Ristad

“You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over.” – Richard Branson

“You have to be able to accept failure to get better.” – LeBron James

“You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don’t try.” – Beverly Sills

Originally published September 13, 2021, updated September 13, 2021

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