fail

verb

1. (intransitive)To be unsuccessful.

   “Throughout my life, I have always failed.”

   “If they ſhoulde gyue battayle it was to be doubted, leaſt through treaſon amõgſt themſelues, the armie ſhould be betrayed into the enimies hands, the which would not fayle to execute all kinde of crueltie in the ſlaughter of the whole nation.”

   “As the world’s drug habit shows, governments are failing in their quest to monitor every London window-box and Andean hillside for banned plants. But even that Sisyphean task looks easy next to the fight against synthetic drugs. No sooner has a drug been blacklisted than chemists adjust their recipe and start churning out a subtly different one.”

2. (transitive)Not to achieve a particular stated goal. (Usage note: The direct object of this word is usually an infinitive.)

   “The truck failed to start.”

3. (transitive)To neglect.

   “The report fails to take into account all the mitigating factors.”

   “Those who have advocated the closure of the G.C. have so far failed to say by which alternative route this North-to-West traffic could be carried.”

4. (intransitive)Of a machine, etc.: to cease to operate correctly.

   “After running five minutes, the engine failed.”

   “We also found that the only emergency egress from the tram was by smashing the front or rear windscreens, and that emergency lighting had failed when the tram overturned.”

5. (transitive)To be wanting to, to be insufficient for, to disappoint, to desert; to disappoint one's expectations.

   “I've failed my parents many times growing up.”

   “There shall not fail thee a man on the throne.”

   “A poor Irish Widow […] went forth with her three children, bare of all resource, to solicit help from the Charitable Establishments of that City. At this Charitable Establishment and then at that she was refused; referred from one to the other, helped by none; — till she had exhausted them all; till her strength and heart failed her: she sank down in typhus-fever […]”

   “That the young Mr. Churchills liked—but they did not like him coming round of an evening and drinking weak whisky-and-water while he held forth on railway debentures and corporation loans. Mr. Barrett, however, by fawning and flattery, seemed to be able to make not only Mrs. Churchill but everyone else do what he desired. And if the arts of humbleness failed him, he overcame you by sheer impudence.”

   “I think... I might've... failed Pomni. Just like I failed Jax. Try too hard to get on their good side, and then I just... end up pushing them away! And then they end up hating me!”

6. (ambitransitive)To receive one or more non-passing grades in academic pursuits.

   “I failed English last year.”

7. (transitive)To give a student a non-passing grade in an academic endeavour.

   “The professor failed me because I did not complete any of the course assignments.”

8. (obsolete, transitive)To miss attaining; to lose.

   “though that seat of earthly bliss be failed”

9. To be wanting; to fall short; to be or become deficient in any measure or degree up to total absence.

   “The crops failed last year.”

   “as the waters fail from the sea”

   “Till Lionel's issue fails, his should not reign.”

10. (archaic)To be affected with want; to come short; to lack; to be deficient or unprovided; used with of.

    “If ever they fail of beauty, this failure is not to be attributed to their size.”

11. (archaic)To fall away; to become diminished; to decline; to decay; to sink.

    “When earnestly they seek / Such proof, conclude they then begin to fail.”

12. (archaic)To deteriorate in respect to vigour, activity, resources, etc.; to become weaker.

    “A sick man fails.”

13. (obsolete)To perish; to die; used of a person.

    “had the king in his last sickness failed”

14. (obsolete)To err in judgment; to be mistaken.

    “Which ofttimes may succeed, so as perhaps / Shall grieve him, if I fail not.”

15. To become unable to meet one's engagements; especially, to be unable to pay one's debts or discharge one's business obligation; to become bankrupt or insolvent.

noun

1. (countable, uncountable)A failure, especially of a financial transaction (a termination of an action).
2. (countable, uncountable)A failing grade in an academic examination.
3. (US, countable, slang, uncountable)A failure (something incapable of success).
4. (slang, uncountable)Poor quality; substandard workmanship.

   “The project was full of fail.”

5. A piece of turf cut from grassland.

adj

1. (US, slang)Unsuccessful; inadequate; unacceptable in some way.

name

1. A surname.