The phonology of Portuguese varies among dialects, in extreme cases leading to some difficulties in mutual intelligibility. This article on phonology focuses on the pronunciations that are generally regarded as standard. Since Portuguese is a pluricentric language, and differences between European Portuguese (EP), Brazilian Portuguese (BP), and Angolan Portuguese (AP) can be considerable, varieties are distinguished whenever necessary.
pronounced as /notice/
The consonant inventory of Portuguese is fairly conservative. The medieval Galician-Portuguese system of seven sibilants (pronounced as //ts dz//, pronounced as //ʃ ʒ//, pronounced as //tʃ//, and apicoalveolar pronounced as //s̺ z̺//) is still distinguished in spelling (intervocalic c/ç z, x g/j, ch, ss -s- respectively), but is reduced to the four fricatives pronounced as //s z ʃ ʒ// by the merger of pronounced as //tʃ// into pronounced as //ʃ// and apicoalveolar pronounced as //s̺ z̺// into either pronounced as //s z// or pronounced as //ʃ ʒ// (depending on dialect and syllable position), except in parts of northern Portugal (most notably in the Trás-os-Montes region). These changes are known as deaffrication. Other than this, there have been no other significant changes to the consonant phonemes since Old Portuguese. However, several consonant phonemes have special allophones at syllable boundaries (often varying quite significantly between European and Brazilian Portuguese), and a few also undergo allophonic changes at word boundaries.
| Labial | Dental/ Alveolar | Palatal | Velar/Uvular | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | |||
| Plosive | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | (pronounced as /link/) | ||
| pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | (pronounced as /link/) | |||
| Fricative | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | |||
| pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | ||||
| Approximant | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | ||||
| Liquid | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | ||||
| pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /link/ | |||||
Phonetic notes
There is a variation in the pronunciation of the first consonant of certain clusters, most commonly C or P in cç, ct, pç and pt. These consonants may be variably elided or conserved. For some words, this variation may exist inside a country, sometimes in all of them; for others, the variation is dialectal, with the consonant being always pronounced in one country and always elided in the other. This variation affects 0.5% of the language's vocabulary, or 575 words out of 110,000.[2] In most cases, Brazilians variably conserve the consonant while speakers elsewhere have invariably ceased to pronounce it (for example, detector in Brazil versus detetor in Portugal). The inverse situation is rarer, occurring in words such as fa(c)to and conta(c)to (consonants never pronounced in Brazil, pronounced elsewhere). Until 2009, this reality could not be apprehended from the spelling: while Brazilians did not write consonants that were no longer pronounced, the spelling of the other countries retained them in many words as silent letters, usually when there was still a vestige of their presence in the pronunciation of the preceding vowel. This could give the false impression that European Portuguese was phonologically more conservative in this aspect, when in fact it was Brazilian Portuguese that retained more consonants in pronunciation.
| fa(c)to | pronounced as /[ˈfa(k)tu]/ | 'fact' | |
| pacto | pronounced as /[ˈpaktu]/ | 'pact' | |
| ta(c)to | pronounced as /[ˈta(k)tu]/ | 'tact' | |
| ca(c)to | pronounced as /[ˈka(k)tu]/ | 'cactus' |
Syllables have the maximal structure of (C)(C)V(C). The only possible codas in European Portuguese are pronounced as //ʃ//, pronounced as //l// and pronounced as //ɾ// and in Brazilian Portuguese pronounced as //s// and pronounced as //ʁ// (or, in a minority of dialects, pronounced as //ʃ, ɾ// or any combination of the former with the latter).
The two rhotic phonemes pronounced as //ʁ// and pronounced as //ɾ// contrast only between oral vowels, similar to Spanish. Elsewhere, their occurrence is predictable by context, with dialectal variations in realization. The rhotic is "hard" (i.e., pronounced as //ʁ//) in the following circumstances:
It is "soft" (i.e., pronounced as //ɾ//) when it occurs in syllable onset clusters (e.g., atributo), and written as a single 'r' between vowels (e.g., dirigir 'to drive')
The realization of the "hard" rhotic pronounced as //ʁ// varies significantly across dialects.
This restricted variation has prompted several authors to postulate a single rhotic phoneme. and see the soft as the unmarked realization and that instances of intervocalic pronounced as /[ʁ]/ result from gemination and a subsequent deletion rule (i.e., carro pronounced as //ˈkaro// > pronounced as /[ˈkaɾʁu]/ > pronounced as /[ˈkaʁu]/). Similarly, argue that the hard is the unmarked realization.
In addition to the phonemic variation between pronounced as //ʁ// and pronounced as //ɾ// between vowels, up to four allophones of the "merged" phoneme /R/ are found in other positions:
The default hard allophone is some sort of voiceless fricative in most dialects, e.g., pronounced as /[χ] [h] [x]/, although other variants are also found. For example, an alveolar trill pronounced as /[r]/ is found in certain conservative dialects down São Paulo, of Italian-speaking, Spanish-speaking, Arabic-speaking, or Slavic-speaking influence. A uvular trill pronounced as /[ʀ]/ is found in areas of German-speaking, French-speaking, and Portuguese-descended influence throughout coastal Brazil down Espírito Santo, most prominently Rio de Janeiro.
The syllable-final allophone shows the greatest variation:
Throughout Brazil, deletion of the word-final rhotic is common, regardless of the "normal" pronunciation of the syllable-final allophone. This pronunciation is particularly common in lower registers, although found in most registers in some areas, e.g., Northeast Brazil, and in the more formal and standard sociolect. It occurs especially in verbs, which always end in R in their infinitive form; in words other than verbs, the deletion is rarer[4] and seems not to occur in monosyllabic non-verb words, such as mar.[5] Evidence of this allophone is often encountered in writing that attempts to approximate the speech of communities with this pronunciation, e.g., the rhymes in the popular poetry (cordel literature) of the Northeast and phonetic spellings (e.g., amá, sofrê in place of amar, sofrer) in Jorge Amado's novels (set in the Northeast) and Gianfrancesco Guarnieri's play Eles não usam black tie (about favela dwellers in Rio de Janeiro).[6]
The soft realization is often maintained across word boundaries in close syntactic contexts (e.g., mar azul pronounced as /[ˈmaɾ aˈzuw]/ 'blue sea').
Portuguese has one of the richest vowel phonologies of all Romance languages, having both oral and nasal vowels, diphthongs, and triphthongs. A phonemic distinction is made between close-mid vowels pronounced as //e o// and the open-mid vowels pronounced as //ɛ ɔ//, as in Italian, Catalan and French, though there is a certain amount of vowel alternation. European Portuguese has also two central vowels, one of which tends to be elided like the e caduc of French.
The central closed vowel pronounced as /[ɨ]/ only occurs in European Portuguese when e is unstressed, e.g. presidente pronounced as /[pɾɨziˈðẽtɨ]/, as well as in Angola; where unlike Portugal, it only occurs in final syllables, e.g. presidente pronounced as /[pɾeziˈdẽtɨ]/. However, pronounced as /[ɨ]/ does not exist in Brazil, e.g. presidente pronounced as /[pɾeziˈdẽtʃi]/.
In Angola, pronounced as //ɐ// and pronounced as //a// merge to pronounced as /[a]/, and pronounced as //ɐ// appears only in final syllables rama pronounced as //ˈʁamɐ//. The nasal pronounced as //ɐ̃// becomes open pronounced as /[ã]/.
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In some cases, Portuguese uses vowel height to contrast stressed syllables with unstressed syllables:
See below for details. The dialects of Portugal are characterized by reducing vowels to a greater extent than others. Falling diphthongs are composed of a vowel followed by one of the high vowels pronounced as //i// or pronounced as //u//; although rising diphthongs occur in the language as well, they can be interpreted as hiatuses.
European Portuguese possesses quite a wide range of vowel allophones:
Furthermore, Cruz-Ferreira gives voiceless allophones of pronounced as //ɨ//, pronounced as //u//, pronounced as //ɐ// in the unstressed word-final position.
The exact realization of the pronounced as //ɐ// varies somewhat amongst dialects. In Brazil, the vowel can be as high as pronounced as /link/ in any environment. It is typically closer in stressed syllables before intervocalic nasals pronounced as //m, n, ɲ// than word-finally, reaching as open a position as pronounced as /link/ in the latter case, and open-mid pronounced as /link/ before nasals, where pronounced as //ɐ// can be nasalized. In European Portuguese, the general situation is similar, except that in some regions the two vowels form minimal pairs in some European dialects. In central European Portuguese this contrast occurs in a limited morphological context, namely in verb conjugation between the first person plural present and past perfect indicative forms of verbs such as pensamos ('we think') and pensámos ('we thought'; spelled (pensamos) in Brazil). Spahr proposes that it is a kind of crasis rather than phonemic distinction of pronounced as //a// and pronounced as //ɐ//. It means that in falamos 'we speak' there is the expected prenasal pronounced as //a//-raising: pronounced as /[fɐˈlɐmuʃ]/, while in falámos 'we spoke' there are phonologically two pronounced as //a// in crasis: pronounced as //faˈlaamos/ > [fɐˈlamuʃ]/ (however, in Brazil both merge, falamos pronounced as /[faˈlɐ̃mus]/. In Angola, on the other hand, both merge as well, but spelling keeps differentiated: falamos/falámos pronounced as /[faˈlamuʃ]/). Close-mid vowels and open-mid vowels (pronounced as //e ~ ɛ// and pronounced as //o ~ ɔ//) contrast only when they are stressed. In unstressed syllables, they occur in complementary distribution. In Brazilian Portuguese, they are raised to close pronounced as //i, u// after a stressed syllable, or in some accents and in general casual speech, also before it.
According to Mateus and d'Andrade (2000:19), in European Portuguese, the stressed pronounced as //ɐ// only occurs in the following three contexts:
English loanwords containing stressed pronounced as //ʌ// or pronounced as //ɜːr// are usually associated with pre-nasal (a) as in rush,[7] [8] or are influenced by orthography as in clube (club),[9] [10] or both, as in surf/surfe.[11]
European Portuguese possesses a near-close near-back unrounded vowel, transcribed pronounced as //ɨ// in this article. It occurs in unstressed syllables such as in pegar pronounced as //pɨˈɡaɾ// ('to grip').
There are very few minimal pairs for this sound, including pregar pronounced as //pɾɨˈɡaɾ// ('to nail') vs. pregar pronounced as //pɾɛˈɡaɾ// ('to preach'; the latter stemming from earlier preegar < Latin praedicāre) as well as jure pronounced as //ˈʒuɾɨ// ('I swear', subjunctive) vs. júri pronounced as //ˈʒuɾi// ('jury').
Diphthongs are not considered independent phonemes in Portuguese, but knowing them can help with spelling and pronunciation.[12]
| Diphthong | Usual spelling | Example | Meaning | Notes and variants | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as //aj// | ai, ái | pai | 'father' | In Brazil, it may be realized as pronounced as /[a]/ before a post-alveolar fricative pronounced as //ʃ, ʒ//, making baixo realized as pronounced as /[ˈbaʃu]/. | |
| pronounced as //ɐj// | ai, âi | plaina | 'jointer' | In several Brazilian dialects; it occurs before nasal consonants and can be nasalised, as in plaina pronounced as /[ˈplɐ̃jnɐ ~ ˈplɐjnɐ ~ ˈplajnɐ]/. | |
| ei, éi, êi | leite | 'milk' | In Greater Lisbon (except by Setúbal) pronounced as //e, ɛ// can be centralized to pronounced as /link/ before palatals pronounced as //j, ɲ, ʃ, ʒ, ʎ//.; e.g. roupeiro pronounced as /[ʁowˈpejɾu - ʁoˈpɐjɾu]/, brenha pronounced as /[ˈbɾeɲɐ - ˈbɾɐ(j)ɲɐ]/, texto pronounced as /[ˈteʃtu - ˈtɐ(j)ʃtu]/, vejo pronounced as /[ˈveʒu - ˈvɐ(j)ʒu]/, coelho pronounced as /[kuˈeʎu - kuˈɐ(j)ʎu]/, anéis pronounced as /[ɐˈnɛjʃ - ɐˈnɐjʃ]/. Before pronounced as //j//, it is often a back vowel pronounced as /link/: pronounced as /[ɐˈnʌjʃ]/ etc. | ||
| pronounced as //ej// | ei, êi | rei | 'king' | In several vernacular dialects (most of Portugal, Brazil and Lusophone Africa), "ei" may be realized essentially as pronounced as /[e]/ in unstressed syllables. Words ending on either -eiro or -eira (like roupeiro pronounced as /[ʁoˈpeɾu]/, bandeira pronounced as /[bɐ̃ˈdeɾɐ]/, brasileiro pronounced as /[bɾaziˈleɾu]/, brasileira pronounced as /[bɾaziˈleɾɐ]/, etc.), when ei precedes a palatal sound (like queijo pronounced as /[ˈkeʒu]/, deixa pronounced as /[ˈdeʃɐ]/, etc.), or when ei precedes a consonant in general (like manteiga pronounced as /[mɐ̃ˈteɡɐ]/, beiço pronounced as /[ˈbesu]/) are optionally monophthongized, depending on the speaker and region (comparable to Spanish ropero, bandera, brasilero, brasilera, queso, deja, manteca, bezo). However, notice that when ei makes up part of a Greco-Latin loanword (like diarreico, anarreico, etc.), as well as nouns ending on -ei (like rei pronounced as /[ˈʁej]/, lei pronounced as /[ˈlej]/) and seis, reino keep their palatal sound pronounced as //ej// (pronounced as //ɛj//, in case of -eico ending nouns and adjectives). In most stressed syllables, the pronunciation is pronounced as //ej//. There are very few minimal pairs for pronounced as //ej// and pronounced as //ɛj//, all of which occur in oxytonic words. In Greater Lisbon, however, it is always pronounced pronounced as /[ɐj]/. | |
| pronounced as //ɛj// | ei, éi | geleia, anéis | 'jelly', 'rings' | It only occurs in -el plurals like anéis (plural of anel 'ring'). In Greater Lisbon, however, it is always pronounced pronounced as /[ɐj]/. | |
| pronounced as //oj// | oi, ôi | dois | 'two' | ||
| pronounced as //ɔj// | oi, ói | dói, destrói | 'hurts', 'destroys' | Pronounced as pronounced as //ɔj// mostly on -oi ending words like herói 'hero', as well as some verbal conjugations. | |
| pronounced as //uj// | ui | fui | 'I went' | Usually stressed. | |
| pronounced as //aw// | au, áu | mau | 'bad' | ||
| pronounced as //ɐw// | au, âu | saudade, trauma | 'to miss', 'trauma' | In EP, when unstressed. In several Brazilian dialects; it occurs before nasal consonants and can be nasalised, as in trauma pronounced as /[ˈtɾɐ̃wmɐ ~ ˈtɾɐwmɐ ~ ˈtɾawmɐ]/. | |
| pronounced as //ew// | eu, êu | seu | 'your'/'yours' | There are very few minimal pairs for pronounced as //eu// and pronounced as //ɛu//, all occurring in oxytonic words. | |
| pronounced as //ɛw// | eu, éu | céu | 'sky' | ||
| pronounced as //iw// | iu | viu | 'he saw' | Usually stressed. | |
| pronounced as //ow// | ou | ouro | 'gold' | Merges optionally with pronounced as //o// in most of modern Portuguese dialects, excluding some regions in northern Portugal.[13] |
There are also some words with two vowels occurring next to each other like in iate and sábio may be pronounced both as rising diphthongs or hiatus.[14] [15] In these and other cases, other diphthongs, diphthong-hiatus or hiatus-diphthong combinations might exist depending on speaker, such as pronounced as /[uw]/ or even pronounced as /[uw.wu]/ for suo ('I sweat'), and in BP pronounced as /[ij]/ or even pronounced as /[ij.ji]/ for fatie ('slice it').
pronounced as /[j]/ and pronounced as /[w]/ are non-syllabic counterparts of the vowels pronounced as //i// and pronounced as //u//, respectively. At least in European Portuguese, the diphthongs pronounced as /[ɛj, aj, ɐj, ɔj, oj, uj, iw, ew, ɛw, aw]/ tend to have more central second elements pronounced as /[ɛɪ̯, aɪ̯, ʌɪ̯, ɔɪ̯, oɪ̯, uɪ̯, iʊ̯, eʊ̯, ɛʊ̯, aʊ̯]/ (as stated above, the starting point of pronounced as //ɐi// is typically back) – note that pronounced as /[ʊ̯]/ is also more weakly rounded than the pronounced as /[u]/ monophthong.
| Nasal vowel | Usual spelling | Example | Meaning | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as //ɐ̃// | ã, am, an | rã, canto | 'frog', 'I sing' or 'corner' | |
| pronounced as //ẽ// | em, en | entro | 'I enter' | |
| pronounced as //ĩ// | im, in | vim | 'I came' | |
| pronounced as //õ// | õ, om, on | sombra | 'shadow' | |
| pronounced as //ũ// | um, un | mundo | 'world' |
Portuguese also has a series of nasalized vowels. analyzes European Portuguese with five monophthongs and five diphthongs, all phonemic: pronounced as //ĩ ẽ ɐ̃ õ ũ ɐ̃j̃ õj̃ ũj̃ ɐ̃w̃ õw̃//. Nasal diphthongs occur mostly at the end of words (or followed by a final sibilant), and in a few compounds.
As in French, the nasal consonants represented by the letters ⟨m n⟩ are deleted in coda position, and in that case the preceding vowel becomes phonemically nasal, e.g. in genro pronounced as //ˈʒẽʁu// ('son-in-law'). But a nasal consonant subsists when it is followed by a plosive, e.g. in cantar pronounced as /[kɐ̃nˈtaɾ]/ ('to sing'). Vowel nasalization has also been observed non-phonemically as result of coarticulation, before heterosyllabic nasal consonants, e.g. in soma pronounced as /[ˈsõmɐ]/ ('sum'). Hence, there is a difference between phonemic nasal vowels and those that are allophonically nasalized. Additionally, a nasal monophthong pronounced as //ɐ̃// written ⟨ã⟩ exists independently of these processes, e.g. in romã pronounced as //ʁoˈmɐ̃// ('pomegranate'). Brazilian Portuguese is seen as being more nasal than European Portuguese due to the presence of these nasalized vowels. Some linguists consider them to be a result of external influences, including the common language spoken at Brazil's coast at time of discovery, Tupi.
The pronounced as //e-ɛ// and pronounced as //o-ɔ// distinction does not happen in nasal vowels; ⟨em om⟩ are pronounced as close-mid. In BP, the vowel pronounced as //a// (which the letter ⟨a⟩ otherwise represents) is sometimes phonemically raised to pronounced as //ɐ// when it is nasal, and also in stressed syllables before heterosyllabic nasal consonants (even if the speaker does not nasalize vowels in this position): compare for instance dama sã pronounced as /[ˈdɐmɐ ˈsɐ̃]/ (PT) or pronounced as /[ˈdɐ̃mɐ ˈsɐ̃]/ (BR) ('healthy lady') and dá maçã pronounced as /[ˈda mɐˈsɐ̃]/ (PT) or pronounced as /[ˈda maˈsɐ̃]/ (BR) ('it gives apples'). pronounced as //a// may also be raised slightly in word-final unstressed syllables.
Nasalization and height increase noticeably with time during the production of a single nasal vowel in BP in those cases that are written with nasal consonants ⟨m n⟩, so that pronounced as //ˈʒẽʁu// may be realized as pronounced as /[ˈʒẽj̃ʁu]/ or pronounced as /[ˈʒẽɰ̃ʁu]/. This creates a significant difference between the realizations of ⟨am⟩ and ⟨ã⟩ for some speakers: compare for instance ranço real pronounced as /[ˈʁɐ̃su ˈʁjal]/ (PT) or pronounced as /[ˈʁɐ̃ɰ̃su ʁeˈaw]/ (BR) ('royal rancidness') and rã surreal pronounced as /[ˈʁɐ̃ suˈʁjal]/ (PT) or pronounced as /[ˈʁɐ̃ suʁeˈaw]/ (BR) ('surreal frog'). (Here pronounced as /[ɰ̃]/ means a velar nasal approximant.) At the end of a word ⟨em⟩ is always pronounced pronounced as /[ẽj̃]/ with a clear nasal palatal approximant (see below). Whenever a nasal vowel is pronounced with a nasal coda (approximant or occlusive) the (phonetic) nasalization of the vowel itself is optional.
The following examples exhaustively demonstrate the general situation for BP.
It follows from these observations that the vowels of BP can be described simply in the following way.
With this description, the examples from before are simply pronounced as //ʁoˈmɐ/, /ˈʒeNʁu/, /sej̃/, /kaNˈtaɾ/, /ˈkɐnu/, /ˈtomu//. Note that the aforementioned description may only apply to Southern-Southeastern dialects of Brazilian Portuguese. But there is no commonly accepted transcription for Brazilian Portuguese phonology.
Vowel nasalization in some dialects of Brazilian Portuguese is very different from that of French, for example. In French, the nasalization extends uniformly through the entire vowel, whereas in the Southern-Southeastern dialects of Brazilian Portuguese, the nasalization begins almost imperceptibly and then becomes stronger toward the end of the vowel. In this respect it is more similar to the nasalization of Hindi-Urdu (see Anusvara). In some cases, the nasal archiphoneme even entails the insertion of a nasal consonant such as pronounced as /[m, n, ŋ, ȷ̃, w̃, ɰ̃]/ (compare), as in the following examples:
| Nasal diphthong | Usual spelling | Example | Meaning | Notes and variants | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as //ɐ̃w̃// | am, ão | falam, mão | 'they speak', 'hand' | The spelling am is used in unstressed syllables (falaram pronounced as /[fɐˈlaɾɐ̃w̃]/, 'they spoke'), whereas ão is for stressed syllables (falarão pronounced as /[fɐlɐˈɾɐ̃w̃]/, 'they will speak') | |
| pronounced as //ɐ̃j̃// | ãe, ãi | mãe, cãibra | 'mom', 'cramp' | In Central and Southern Portugal, it is also the colloquial pronunciation of /ẽj/, which means mãe and bem rhyme. | |
| pronounced as //ẽj̃// | em | bem | 'well' | In Greater Lisbon, it merges to pronounced as /[ɐ̃j]/, which means mãe and bem rhyme. | |
| pronounced as //õw̃ ~ õ//[16] [17] | om | bom | 'good' | The diphthongization of such nasal vowel is controversial. | |
| pronounced as //õj̃// | õe | põe | '(he/she) puts' | ||
| pronounced as //ũj̃// | ui | muito | 'very', 'much' | Only nasalized in words derived from muito (including mui). |
Most times nasal diphthongs occur at the end of the word. They are:
pronounced as /[j̃]/ and pronounced as /[w̃]/ are nasalized, non-syllabic counterparts of the vowels pronounced as //i// and pronounced as //u//, respectively. In European Portuguese, they are normally not fully close, being closer to pronounced as /[ɪ̯̃ ʊ̯̃]/. As with the oral pronounced as /[ʊ̯]/, the nasal pronounced as /[ʊ̯̃]/ is not only more central but also more weakly rounded than the pronounced as /link/ monophthong. This is not transcribed in this article.
The stressed relatively open vowels pronounced as //a, ɛ, ɔ// contrast with the stressed relatively close vowels pronounced as //ɐ, e, o// in several kinds of grammatically meaningful alternation:
There are also pairs of unrelated words that differ in the height of these vowels, such as besta pronounced as //e// ('beast') and besta pronounced as //ɛ// ('crossbow'); mexo pronounced as //e// ('I move') and mecho pronounced as //ɛ// ('I highlight [hair]'); molho pronounced as //o// ('sauce') and molho pronounced as //ɔ// ('bunch'); corte pronounced as //ɔ// ('cut') and corte pronounced as //o// ('court'); meta pronounced as //e// ('I put' subjunctive) and meta pronounced as //ɛ// ('goal'); and (especially in Portugal) para pronounced as //ɐ// ('for') and para pronounced as //a// ('he stops'); forma pronounced as //o// ('mold') and forma pronounced as //ɔ// ('shape').
There are several minimal pairs in which a clitic containing the vowel pronounced as //ɐ// contrasts with a monosyllabic stressed word containing pronounced as //a//: da vs. dá, mas vs. más, a vs. à pronounced as //a//, etc. In BP, however, these words may be pronounced with pronounced as //a// in some environments.
Some isolated vowels (meaning those that are neither nasal nor part of a diphthong) tend to change quality in a fairly predictable way when they become unstressed. In the examples below, the stressed syllable of each word is in boldface. The term "final" should be interpreted here as at the end of a word or before word-final -s.
| Spelling | Stressed | Unstressed, not final | Unstressed and final | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| a | pronounced as //a// or pronounced as //ɐ// (BR, EP) pronounced as //a// (AP) | parto pronounced as //a// pensamos pronounced as //ɐ// (BR, EP); pronounced as //a// (AP) | pronounced as //ɐ// or pronounced as //a// (EP) pronounced as //a// (AP, BP) | partir pronounced as //a// (BR, AP); pronounced as //ɐ// (EP) ação pronounced as //a// | pronounced as //ɐ// | pensa pronounced as //ɐ// | |
| ai | pronounced as //aj// or pronounced as //aj ~ ɐj// (BR) pronounced as //aj// (EP, AP) | pai pronounced as //aj// plaina pronounced as //aj ~ ɐj// (BR); pronounced as //aj// (EP, AP) | pronounced as //aj// (BR, AP) pronounced as //ɐj// (EP) | apaixonar pronounced as //aj// (BR, AP); pronounced as //ɐj// (EP) | – | – | |
| au | pronounced as //aw// or pronounced as //aw ~ ɐw// (BR) pronounced as //aw// (EP, AP) | pau pronounced as //aw// fauna pronounced as //aw ~ ɐw// (BR); pronounced as //aw// (EP, AP) | pronounced as //aw// (BR, AP) pronounced as //ɐw// (EP) | saudade pronounced as //aw// (BR, AP); pronounced as //ɐw// (EP) | – | – | |
| e | pronounced as //e// or pronounced as //ɛ// | mover pronounced as //e// pega pronounced as //ɛ// | pronounced as //e// (BR) pronounced as //ɨ// or pronounced as //ɛ// (EP) pronounced as //e// or pronounced as //ɛ// (AP) | pregar pronounced as //e// (BP, AP); pronounced as //ɨ// (EP) (to nail) pregar pronounced as //e// (BP); pronounced as //ɛ// (EP, AP) (to preach, to advocate) | pronounced as //i// (BR) pronounced as //ɨ// (EP, AP) | move pronounced as //i// (BP); pronounced as //ɨ// (EP, AP) | |
| ei | pronounced as //ej ~ e// or pronounced as //ɛj// pronounced as //ɐj// (Lisbon) | peixe pronounced as //ej ~ e//; pronounced as //ɐj// (Lisbon) anéis pronounced as //ɛj//; pronounced as //ɐj// (Lisbon) | pronounced as //ej ~ e// pronounced as //ɐj// (Lisbon) | eleição pronounced as //ej ~ e//; pronounced as //ɐj// (Lisbon) | pronounced as //ej ~ e// pronounced as //ɐj// (Lisbon) | possíveis pronounced as //ej ~ e//; pronounced as //ɐj// (Lisbon) | |
| eu | pronounced as //ew// or pronounced as //ɛw// | meu pronounced as //ew// céu pronounced as //ɛw// | pronounced as //ew// | europeu pronounced as //ew// | – | – | |
| o | pronounced as //o// or pronounced as //ɔ// | pôde pronounced as //o// pode pronounced as //ɔ// | pronounced as //o// (BP) pronounced as //u// or pronounced as //ɔ// (EP) pronounced as //o// or pronounced as //ɔ// (AP) | poder pronounced as //o// (BP, AP); pronounced as //u// (EP) você pronounced as //o// (BP); pronounced as //ɔ// (EP, AP) | pronounced as //u// | pato pronounced as //u// | |
| oi | pronounced as //oj// or pronounced as //ɔj// | coisa pronounced as //oj// dói pronounced as //ɔj// | pronounced as //oj// | oitavo pronounced as //oj// | – | – | |
| ou | pronounced as //ow ~ o// | ouro pronounced as //ow ~ o// | pronounced as //ow ~ o// | dourado pronounced as //ow ~ o// | – | – | |
With a few exceptions mentioned in the previous sections, the vowels pronounced as //a// and pronounced as //ɐ// occur in complementary distribution when stressed, the latter before nasal consonants followed by a vowel, and the former elsewhere.
In Brazilian Portuguese, the general pattern in the southern and western accents is that the stressed vowels pronounced as //a, ɐ//, pronounced as //e, ɛ//, pronounced as //o, ɔ// neutralize to pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //e//, pronounced as //o//, respectively, in unstressed syllables, as is common in Romance languages. In final unstressed syllables, however, they are raised to pronounced as //ɐ//, pronounced as //i//, pronounced as //u//. In casual BP (as well as in the fluminense dialect), unstressed pronounced as //e// and pronounced as //o// may be raised to pronounced as //i//, pronounced as //u// on any unstressed syllable, as long as it has no coda. However, in the dialects of Northeastern Brazilian (as spoken in the states of Bahia and Pernambuco), non-final unstressed vowels are often open-mid pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //ɛ//, pronounced as //ɔ//, independent of vowel harmony with surrounding lower vowels.
European Portuguese has taken this process one step further, raising pronounced as //a, ɐ//, pronounced as //e, ɛ//, pronounced as //o, ɔ// to pronounced as //ɐ//, pronounced as //ɨ//, pronounced as //u// in almost all unstressed syllables. The vowels pronounced as //ɐ// and pronounced as //ɨ// are also more centralized than their Brazilian counterparts. The three unstressed vowels pronounced as //ɐ, ɨ, u// are reduced and often voiceless or elided in fast speech.
However, Angolan Portuguese has been more conservative, raising pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //e, ɛ//, pronounced as //o, ɔ// to pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //e//, pronounced as //o// in unstressed syllables; and to pronounced as //ɐ//, pronounced as //ɨ//, pronounced as //u// in final unstressed syllables. Which makes it almost similar to Brazilian Portuguese (except by final pronounced as //ɨ//, which is inherited from European Portuguese).
There are some exceptions to the rules above. For example, pronounced as //i// occurs instead of unstressed pronounced as //e// or pronounced as //ɨ//, word-initially or before another vowel in hiatus (teatro, reúne, peão). pronounced as //ɨ// is often deleted entirely word-initially in the combination pronounced as //ɨsC// becoming pronounced as /[ʃC ~ ʒC]/. Also, pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //ɛ// or pronounced as //ɔ// appear in some unstressed syllables in EP, being marked in the lexicon, like espetáculo (spectacle) pronounced as /[ʃpɛˈtakulu]/; these occur from deletion of the final consonant in a closed syllable and from crasis. And there is some dialectal variation in the unstressed sounds: the northern and eastern accents of BP have low vowels in unstressed syllables, pronounced as //ɛ, ɔ//, instead of the high vowels pronounced as //e, o//. However, the Brazilian media tends to prefer the southern pronunciation. In any event, the general paradigm is a useful guide for pronunciation and spelling.
Nasal vowels, vowels that belong to falling diphthongs, and the high vowels pronounced as //i// and pronounced as //u// are not affected by this process, nor is the vowel pronounced as //o// when written as the digraph (ou) (pronounced pronounced as //ow// in conservative EP).
In BP, an epenthetic vowel pronounced as /[i]/ is sometimes inserted between consonants, to break up consonant clusters that are not native to Portuguese, in learned words and in borrowings.[18] [19] This also happens at the ends of words after consonants that cannot occur word-finally (e.g., pronounced as //d//, pronounced as //k//, pronounced as //f//). For example, psicologia ('psychology') may be pronounced pronounced as /['''pis'''ikoloˈʒiɐ]/; adverso ('adverse') may be pronounced pronounced as /[a'''dʒiˈv'''ɛʁsu]/; McDonald's may be pronounced pronounced as /[mɛ'''kiˈd'''õnaw'''dʒis''']/. In northern Portugal, an epenthetic pronounced as /[ɨ]/ may be used instead, pronounced as /['''pɨs'''ikuluˈʒiɐ]/, pronounced as /[ɐ'''ðɨˈβ'''ɛɾsu]/, but in southern Portugal there is often no epenthesis, pronounced as /['''ps'''ikuluˈʒiɐ]/, pronounced as /[ɐ'''dˈv'''ɛɾsu]/. Epenthesis at the end of a word does not normally occur in Portugal.
The native Portuguese consonant clusters, where there is not epenthesis, are sequences of a non-sibilant oral consonant followed by the liquids pronounced as //ɾ// or pronounced as //l//, and the complex consonants pronounced as //ks, kw, ɡw//. Some examples: flagrante pronounced as //flɐˈɡɾɐ̃tɨ//, complexo pronounced as //kõˈplɛksu//, fixo pronounced as //ˈfiksu// (but not ficção pronounced as //fikˈsɐ̃w//), latex pronounced as //ˈlatɛks//, quatro pronounced as //ˈkʷatɾu//, guaxinim pronounced as //ɡʷɐʃiˈnĩ//, pronounced as //ɡʷaʃiˈnĩ//
When two words belonging to the same phrase are pronounced together, or two morphemes are joined in a word, the last sound in the first may be affected by the first sound of the next (sandhi), either coalescing with it, or becoming shorter (a semivowel), or being deleted. This affects especially the sibilant consonants pronounced as //s//, pronounced as //z//, pronounced as //ʃ//, pronounced as //ʒ//, and the unstressed final vowels pronounced as //ɐ//, pronounced as //i, ɨ//, pronounced as //u//.
As was mentioned above, the dialects of Portuguese can be divided into two groups, according to whether syllable-final sibilants are pronounced as postalveolar consonants pronounced as //ʃ//, pronounced as //ʒ// or as alveolar pronounced as //s//, pronounced as //z//. At the end of words, the default pronunciation for a sibilant is voiceless, pronounced as //ʃ, s//, but in connected speech the sibilant is treated as though it were within a word (assimilation):
When two identical sibilants appear in sequence within a word, they reduce to a single consonant. For example, nascer, desço, excesso, exsudar are pronounced with pronounced as /[s]/ by speakers who use alveolar sibilants at the end of syllables, and disjuntor is pronounced with pronounced as /[ʒ]/ by speakers who use postalveolars. But if the two sibilants are different they may be pronounced separately, depending on the dialect. Thus, the former speakers will pronounce the last example with pronounced as /[zʒ]/, whereas the latter speakers will pronounce the first examples with pronounced as /[s]/ if they are from Brazil or pronounced as /[ʃs]/ if from Portugal (although in relaxed pronunciation one of the siblants may be dropped). This applies also to words that are pronounced together in connected speech:
Normally, only the three vowels pronounced as //ɐ//, pronounced as //i// (in BP) or pronounced as //ɨ// (in EP), and pronounced as //u// occur in unstressed final position. If the next word begins with a similar vowel, they merge with it in connected speech, producing a single vowel, possibly long (crasis). Here, "similar" means that nasalization can be disregarded, and that the two central vowels pronounced as //a, ɐ// can be identified with each other. Thus,
If the next word begins with a dissimilar vowel, then pronounced as //i// and pronounced as //u// become approximants in Brazilian Portuguese (synaeresis):
In careful speech and in with certain function words, or in some phrase stress conditions (see Mateus and d'Andrade, for details), European Portuguese has a similar process:
But in other prosodic conditions, and in relaxed pronunciation, EP simply drops final unstressed pronounced as //ɨ// and pronounced as //u// (elision), though this is subject to significant dialectal variation:
Aside from historical set contractions formed by prepositions plus determiners or pronouns, like à/dà, ao/do, nesse, dele, etc., on one hand and combined clitic pronouns such as mo/ma/mos/mas (it/him/her/them to/for me), and so on, on the other, Portuguese spelling does not reflect vowel sandhi. In poetry, however, an apostrophe may be used to show elision such as in d'água.
Primary stress may fall on any of the three final syllables of a word, but most commonly on the last two, as antepenultimate stress is relatively less frequent in the language. There is a partial correlation between the position of the stress and the final vowel; for example, the final syllable is usually stressed when it contains a nasal phoneme, a diphthong, or a close vowel—this is especially relevant given the influence of Indigenous languages in Brazil, as indigenous words often have final stress: urubu 'vulture', açaí 'açai', both of which originate from Tupi and have final stress. The orthography of Portuguese takes advantage of this correlation to minimize the number of diacritics, but orthographic rules vary in different regions (e.g., Brazil and Portugal), and should not be used as a reliable guide to stress, despite the existing correlations found in the grapheme-phoneme conversion of Portuguese data.[22]
As in English, stress in verbs and non-verbs is computed differently.[23] For verbs, stress is deterministic, as different morphemes determine the location of stress in a given word based on tense, mood, person and number. For this reason, the few examples one can find of minimal pairs of lexical stress involve either different verb forms for a given stem, such as ruíram /ʁuˈiɾɐ̃w̃/ 'they collapsed' vs. ruirão /ʁuiˈɾɐ̃w̃/ 'they will collapse', or a noun-verb pair, such as dúvida /ˈduvidɐ/ 'doubt' vs. duvida /duˈvidɐ/ 's/he doubts'. For example, regardless of which verb one considers, stress is always final for the first person singular in the future simple tense (indicative): (eu) falarei 'I will speak'. For nouns and adjectives (i.e., non-verbs), stress is mostly affected by phonological factors such as syllable weight,[24] [25] although morphology also plays a role, as different suffixes may affect the location of stress in a given word. In simple terms, the algorithm for stress in non-verbs is similar to that of English and Latin (modulo the extrametricality of the final syllable, which is absent in Portuguese): stress is final if the final syllable is heavy and penultimate otherwise. A heavy syllable contains a diphthong or a coda consonant. All other patterns are considered to be irregular in most approaches in the literature, even though subregularities have been determined and discussed in recent studies. Finally, syllable weight has also been shown to affect the position of secondary stress in the language, whose location can vary in words with an odd number of pre-tonic syllables. In such words, there's some experimental evidence showing that the presence of a given syllable containing a coda leads to a preference for secondary stress in said syllable.
Tone is not lexically significant in Portuguese, but phrase- and sentence-level tones are important. As in most Romance languages, interrogation on yes–no questions is expressed mainly by sharply raising the tone at the end of the sentence. An exception to this is the word oi that is subject to meaning changes: an exclamation tone means 'hi/hello', and in an interrogative tone it means 'I didn't understand'.
As for prosodic domains, the presence of metrical feet in Portuguese has been called into question in a recent study, which argues that no strong evidence exists in the language that supports this particular domain (at least Brazilian Portuguese)—despite the presence of stress and secondary stress, both of which are typically (albeit not always) associated with feet.[26]