Survivorship Bias

Survivorship bias is a mental trap where we focus only on the people or things that succeeded while completely ignoring those that failed. Imagine you’re trying to understand how difficult a video game is by only talking to players who finished it, while ignoring all the players who quit halfway through. You’d get a completely skewed picture of the game’s difficulty.

This bias happens because success stories are naturally more visible and memorable. Successful businesses stay in the news, thriving artists get media coverage, and winning strategies get documented. Meanwhile, the failures quietly disappear from view. Failed companies close down, struggling artists remain unknown, and losing strategies get forgotten. The result is that we see only the “survivors” of any selection process, creating a false impression that success is more common and achievable than it actually is.

The term gained prominence from mathematician Abraham Wald’s work during World War II. When military engineers studied returning bombers to decide where to add armor, they initially wanted to reinforce the areas with the most bullet holes. Wald realized this was backwards. Those planes had survived despite being hit in those spots. The real vulnerability was in areas with no holes on returning planes, because planes hit there never made it back.

• In business, we’re constantly bombarded with stories of successful entrepreneurs who dropped out of college. These stories make dropping out seem like a smart career move, but they completely ignore the millions of college dropouts who never achieved similar success. In reality, for many fields, finishing the college gives a better chance of career success.

• In investing, we hear endless stories about people making fortunes in cryptocurrency or the stock market. What we don’t hear about are the countless individuals who invested their life savings and lost everything. The media rarely writes articles about financial disasters because those stories are less inspiring and get fewer clicks.

• When someone remarks that “they don’t make them like they used to” while pointing to their grandmother’s 40-year-old refrigerator, they’re forgetting about all the appliances from that era that broke down and were thrown away decades ago. We only see the exceptional products that survived, not the typical ones that failed.

• Gyms prominently feature transformation success stories while the countless members who saw no results simply cancel their memberships and disappear from view.

You might have a skewed view of your success chances. When you only see the winners, you might believe that starting a business, becoming an influencer, or making it as an artist is easier than it actually is.

You might try to replicate the habits and choices of successful people without realizing that countless others followed the same strategies and failed. You might also overlook the fact that many successful people had to try multiple times before they succeeded.

Success stories often omits the facts on how uncertain it is to achieve the desired outcome. Investment funds often showcase their best-performing portfolios while quietly closing their unsuccessful ones. Lotteries shows you only a few that won while making the failing majority (and how much they already spent) invisible.

Whenever you encounter an inspiring tale of achievement, ask yourself: “What am I not seeing here?” For every college dropout who became a billionaire, there are thousands who dropped out and never achieved similar success. When presented with a success story, deliberately consider what factors might have contributed that aren’t immediately visible. Were there elements of luck, timing, or unique circumstances that can’t be easily replicated? What external factors beyond the person’s control played a role?

Instead of only studying winners, deliberately seek out stories of those who tried and failed. Read post-mortems of failed companies, interview people who attempted similar paths but didn’t succeed, and examine case studies that include both positive and negative outcomes. For example, if you’re considering starting a business, don’t just read about successful startups. Research why businesses fail, what common mistakes entrepreneurs make, and what the actual failure rates are in your industry.

Search for the actual statistical likelihood of success in your chosen area. If you want to become a professional athlete, look at how many people actually make it to the professional level compared to those who try. This helps ground your expectations in reality rather than just inspirational examples.

Rather than trying to copy successful people’s specific choices, pay attention to their decision-making processes, how they handled setbacks, and how they adapted when things didn’t go according to plan. These skills are more transferable than their particular circumstances. During your investigation, look for repeatable patterns and always ask “Is it something that really affected the outcome or just a coincidence?”