Furtive vs Unsuccessful - What's the difference?

As adjectives the difference between furtive and unsuccessful

is that furtive is stealthy while unsuccessful is failed, not successful.

(en adjective)

stealthy

Exhibiting guilty or evasive secrecy.

* 1949 , George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four , p31

But that was merely a piece of furtive knowledge which he happened to possess because his memory was not satisfactorily under control.

* (stealthy) surreptitious * See also

* furtively * furtiveness

(en adjective)

Failed, not successful.

His unsuccessful attempt earned him sympathy, condolences...and an occasional good-natured ribbing.

* successful

* unsuccessfully * unsuccessfulness