English · Idiom Candidate

fail upwards

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Also seen as: fail up

Both English Tiếng Việt

Meaning · English

To experience career advancement despite or because of failures

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

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Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Literally: to fail in a direction that is up

Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

After his project failed, he surprisingly got a promotion and failed upwards

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

Sources & notes

Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-30; pending editor spot-check.

Common questions

What does “fail upwards” mean?

To experience career advancement despite or because of failures Literally: to fail in a direction that is up

Is “fail upwards” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.