Top 40 Failure Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Losers quit when they fail. Winners fail until they succeed.”

— Robert T. Kiyosaki

Also featured in: Quitting Quotes

2. “If you learn from defeat, you haven't really lost.”

— Zig Ziglar

3. “If you want to increase your success rate, double your failure rate.”

— Thomas J. Watson

Also featured in: Hard Work Quotes, Learning Quotes

4. “Being defeated is often a temporary condition. Giving up is what makes it permanent.”

— Marilyn Vos Savant

Also featured in: Motivational Bodybuilding Quotes, Giving Up Quotes

5. “In order to succeed, your desire for success should be greater than your fear of failure. ”

— Bill Cosby

Also featured in: Success Quotes, Inspirational Quotes

6. “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 in my life. And that is why I succeed.”

— Michael Jordan

7. “Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.”

— John F. Kennedy

Also featured in: Inspirational Quotes, Courage Quotes

8. “Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Persistence Quotes, Giving Up Quotes

9. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Positive Quotes, Startup Quotes, Inspirational Quotes, Perseverance Quotes

10. “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”

— Winston Churchill

Also featured in: Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Success Quotes, Inspirational Quotes, Courage Quotes, Perseverance Quotes

11. “Experience is merely the name men gave to their mistakes.”

— Oscar Wilde

12. “Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”

— Winston Churchill

Also featured in: Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Success Quotes, Persistence Quotes

13. “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

Also featured in: Motivational Quotes, Graduation Quotes

14. “Success depends upon previous preparation, and without such preparation there is sure to be failure.”

— Confucius

15. “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

Also featured in: Quotes About Money

16. “There are no secrets to success: don’t waste time looking for them. Success is the result of perfection, hard work, learning from failure, loyalty to those for whom you work, and persistence.”

— Colin Powell

Also featured in: Success Quotes, Persistence Quotes

17. “You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing that we call ‘failure’ is not the falling down, but the staying down.”

— Mary Pickford

18. “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

Also featured in: Moving On Quotes, Spirituality Quotes

19. “Once we realize that imperfect understanding is the human condition there is no shame in being wrong, only in failing to correct our mistakes.”

— George Soros

Also featured in: Mistake Quotes, Understanding Quotes

20. “Failure is not a single, cataclysmic event. You don’t fail overnight. Instead, failure is a few errors in judgement, repeated every day.”

— Jim Rohn

21. “Failure is simply an opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.”

— Henry Ford

Also featured in: Startup Quotes

22. “If you fell down yesterday, stand up today.”

— H. G. Wells

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

— Confucius

24. “I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can't accept not trying.”

— Michael Jordan

Also featured in: Startup Quotes, Change Quotes, Encouraging Quotes

25. “Excuses are the nails used to build a house of failure. ”

— Jim Rohn

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

— Richard Branson

Also featured in: Business Quotes

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

— Paulo Coelho

Also featured in: Inspirational Quotes

28. “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”

— Albert Einstein

Also featured in: Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Inspirational Quotes, Change Quotes

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

— Bill Gates

Also featured in: Success Quotes

30. “Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat.”

— F. Scott Fitzgerald

Also featured in: Motivational Quotes, Perseverance Quotes, Spirituality Quotes

31. “I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everyone.”

— Bill Cosby

Also featured in: Success Quotes

32. “Forget about the consequences of failure. Failure is only a temporary change in direction to set you straight for your next success.”

— Denis Waitley

33. “Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure.”

— George E. Woodberry

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

— Og Mandino

Also featured in: Being Strong Quotes, Encouraging Quotes

35. “I didn’t fail the test, I just found 100 ways to do it wrong.”

— Benjamin Franklin

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

— Dale Carnegie

Also featured in: Encouraging Quotes

37. “You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. 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

Also featured in: Mistake Quotes, Bullying Quotes

38. “Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.”

— John Wooden

Also featured in: Change Quotes

39. “Do not fear mistakes. You will know failure. Continue to reach out.”

— Benjamin Franklin

Also featured in: Courage Quotes, Fear Quotes

40. “For every failure, there’s an alternative course of action. You just have to find it. When you come to a roadblock, take a detour.”

— Mary Kay Ash

41. “Doubt kills more dreams than failure ever will.”

— Suzy Kassem

Also featured in: Motivational Quotes, Courage Quotes, Confidence Quotes, Action Quotes

42. “Failure is an option here. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough.”

— Elon Musk

Also featured in: Motivational Quotes, Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Startup Quotes

43. “Fall down seven times, get up eight.”

— Japanese Proverb

Also featured in: Inspirational Entrepreneurship Quotes, Perseverance Quotes, Quotes About Strength, Determination Quotes

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

— Thomas A. Edison

Also featured in: Positive Quotes, Success Quotes, Perseverance Quotes, Persistence Quotes