successful

English

Etymology

From success +‎ -ful.

Pronunciation

• enPR: sək-sĕsʹfəl, IPA^(key): /səkˈsɛs.fl̩/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Adjective

successful (comparative more successful, superlative most successful)

1. Resulting in success; assuring, or promoting, success; accomplishing what was proposed; having the desired effect

   Synonyms: prosperous, fortunate, happy

   a successful use of medicine;  a successful experiment;  a successful enterprise

   • 2006, Edwin Black, chapter 1, in Internal Combustion‎^[1]:

     If successful, Edison and Ford—in 1914—would move society away from the ever more expensive and then universally known killing hazards of gasoline cars: […] .

   • 2013 June 21, Oliver Burkeman, “The tao of tech”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 2, page 27:

     The dirty secret of the internet is that all this distraction and interruption is immensely profitable. Web companies like to boast about […], or offering services that let you […] "share the things you love with the world" and so on. But the real way to build a successful online business is to be better than your rivals at undermining people's control of their own attention.

Synonyms

• efficacious, effective, fruitful, rewarding, accomplished, profitable
• See also Thesaurus:prosperous
• (of requests): tithe (obs.)

Antonyms

• unsuccessful
• failed

Derived terms

• behind every successful man there stands a woman
• successfully
• successfulness

Related terms

• success

Translations

resulting in success

• Arabic: نَاجِح (nājiḥ), فَائِز (fāʔiz), مُوَفَّق (muwaffaq)
• Azerbaijani: uğurlu (az), müvəffəqiyyətli
• Basque: arrakastatsu
• Belarusian: паспяхо́вы (paspjaxóvy)
• Bengali: সফল (bn) (śophol), কামিয়াব (bn) (kamiẏab)
• Bulgarian: успе́шен (bg) (uspéšen)
• Catalan: reeixit (ca)
• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 成功嘅 (sing⁴ gong¹ ge³)

  Mandarin: 有成效的 (zh) (yǒu chéngxiào de), 完滿／完满 (zh) (wánmǎn), 成功的 (zh) (chénggōng de)

• Crimean Tatar: muvaffaq
• Czech: úspěšný (cs) m
• Danish: succesfuld, succesrig
• Dutch: succesvol (nl), geslaagd (nl), gelukt (nl)
• Esperanto: sukcesa
• Estonian: edukas, õnnestunud
• Finnish: onnistunut (fi), menestynyt, menestyvä
• French: ayant du succès, marqué de succès, couronné de succès (fr)
• Georgian: წარმატებული (c̣armaṭebuli)
• German: erfolgreich (de)
• Greek: επιτυχημένος (el) (epitychiménos), επιτυχών (el) (epitychón)

  Ancient: οὔριος (oúrios)

• Hebrew: מוצלח (he) (mutzlákh)
• Hindi: सफल (hi) (saphal)
• Hungarian: sikeres (hu), eredményes (hu)
• Indonesian: berhasil (id), sukses (id)
• Irish: áitheasach
• Italian: di successo, coronato dal successo, riuscito (it)
• Japanese: 成功した (ja) (せいこうした, seikō shita)
• Korean: 성공적(成功的) (ko) (seonggongjeok), 성공(成功)한 (ko) (seonggonghan)
• Latin: prosper, prosperus
• Lithuanian: sėkmingas
• Lü: ᦷᦎᧅᦑᦲᧈ (ṫoktii¹), ᦷᦎᧅᦑᦲᧈᦔᦲᧃᦡᦲ (ṫoktii¹ṗiinḋii)
• Macedonian: у́спешен (úspešen)
• Malay: berjaya (ms)
• Maori: momoho, angitu
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: vellykket

  Nynorsk: vellukka

• Old English: spēdiġ
• Persian: موفق (fa) (movaffaq), کامگار (fa) (kâmgâr)
• Polish: udany (pl)
• Portuguese: bem-sucedido (pt), conseguido (pt), próspero (pt) m
• Romanian: reușit (ro), izbutit (ro), plin de succes
• Russian: успе́шный (ru) (uspéšnyj), благополу́чный (ru) (blagopolúčnyj), уда́чный (ru) (udáčnyj)
• Sanskrit: सफल (sa) (saphala)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: успешан, успјешан

  Roman: uspešan (sh), uspješan (sh)

• Slovak: úspešný m
• Slovene: uspešen
• Spanish: exitoso, logrado (es), afortunado (es), de éxito
• Swedish: lyckad (sv), framgångsrik (sv)
• Turkish: muvaffak (tr) , başarılı (tr)
• Ukrainian: успі́шний (uspíšnyj), вда́тний (vdátnyj)
• Urdu: سپھل (saphal)
• Vietnamese: thành công (vi)
• Yiddish: הצלחהדיק (hatslokhedik)