as in futile
producing no results
an unsuccessful attempt to fix the faucet ourselves
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of unsuccessful
Trump met Kim three times during his first term in office in an unsuccessful bid to press him to give up his nuclear weapons.
—
Robert Birsel, MSNBC Newsweek, 2 Sep. 2025
The split will reverse a massive but largely unsuccessful 2015 merger arranged by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway and the investment firm 3G Capital, Heinz and Kraft’s owners at the time.
—Nathaniel Meyersohn, CNN Money, 2 Sep. 2025
These attempts, however, have been unsuccessful.
—Mark Temnycky, Forbes.com, 2 Sep. 2025
In later filings, documents show his attempt to appeal the conviction was unsuccessful, but he was not deported.
—Kristi Miller, Twin Cities, 1 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for unsuccessful
Robert Birsel, MSNBC Newsweek, 2 Sep. 2025
The split will reverse a massive but largely unsuccessful 2015 merger arranged by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway and the investment firm 3G Capital, Heinz and Kraft’s owners at the time.
—Nathaniel Meyersohn, CNN Money, 2 Sep. 2025
These attempts, however, have been unsuccessful.
—Mark Temnycky, Forbes.com, 2 Sep. 2025
In later filings, documents show his attempt to appeal the conviction was unsuccessful, but he was not deported.
—Kristi Miller, Twin Cities, 1 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for unsuccessful
Recent Examples of Synonyms for unsuccessful
Adjective
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And, perhaps most dangerous still, these dreams of modernity shine an unwanted light on the futile hardship of the family’s status quo.—
Adam Solomons,
IndieWire,
4 Sep. 2025
-
This alternating strategy is futile.—
Wesley Alexander Hill,
Forbes.com,
3 Sep. 2025
Adjective
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This method is a significant departure from traditional chemical recycling techniques like pyrolysis, which operate at lower temperatures (450–600°C) and produce over a hundred different by-products, many of which are useless.—
Aman Tripathi,
Interesting Engineering,
3 Sep. 2025
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Economists usually look at new jobs, but immigration is now very low, making that figure useless as a measure of how the economy is doing.—
Bill Conerly,
Forbes.com,
30 Aug. 2025
Adjective
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Garbowit recalls that there were only around sixteen members of Congress lined up behind Thanedor’s abortive resolution—so the fact that Green’s follow-up motion garnered seventy-nine supporters in the caucus is a sign of progress.—
Chris Lehmann,
Harpers Magazine,
20 Aug. 2025
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On the one hand, as Tevye is fond of saying, the story unfolds in a hardscrabble shtetl in the Ukrainian plains in the months leading up to the Russian Empire’s abortive 1905 revolution.—
David Lyman,
The Enquirer,
25 July 2025
Cite this Entry
“Unsuccessful.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/unsuccessful. Accessed 9 Sep. 2025.
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