Master Brazilian Portuguese grammar through structured lessons
37 grammar points
The Brazilian Portuguese alphabet consists of 26 letters since 2009, when K, W, and Y were officially added,…
Portuguese nouns are either masculine or feminine, with most words ending in -o being masculine and most…
Regular plurals are formed by changing the ending of the noun or adjective according to predictable rules.
Definite articles are tiny words that mean "the" and must match the gender (masculine or feminine) and number…
Indefinite articles are used when referring to something non-specific and must agree in gender and number…
Personal pronouns used as subjects: eu, tu, ele/ela, nós, vocês, eles/elas
A gente is the default spoken Brazilian way to say "we". It means the same as nós in many contexts, but it…
Portuguese prepositions em, de, para, com, and por are small words that control relationships between…
Common contractions formed by prepositions and articles
Brazilian Portuguese uses different ways to say "you" depending on region, distance, and formality. The most…
Regular -AR verbs form the largest verb group in Portuguese and follow predictable patterns in the present…
Regular –ER verbs in the present indicative are used to talk about current or habitual actions involving…
Regular –IR verbs in the present indicative describe actions happening now or habitually, just like –AR and…
Portuguese has two verbs meaning "to be" – ser and estar – each with distinct uses and completely irregular…
Ter (to have), ir (to go), and fazer (to do/make) are essential irregular verbs that appear in almost every…
Poder (can/to be able), querer (to want), and precisar (to need) are the three most essential modal verbs in…
Portuguese forms questions primarily through intonation in spoken language, with optional verb-subject…
Question words (also called interrogative pronouns or adverbs) are essential tools to ask for information.…
Portuguese quantifiers express amounts and quantities, with most requiring gender and number agreement with…
Portuguese forms yes/no questions primarily through rising intonation without changing word order, and…
This essential A1 skill combines basic question words, modal verbs, and polite phrases to help learners…
Portuguese has seven oral vowel sounds with the distinctive feature of open and closed versions of /e/ and…
Portuguese nasal sounds, produced by letting air flow through both mouth and nose simultaneously, are marked…
Portuguese consonant pairs follow voiced/voiceless patterns similar to English, but with crucial differences…
The letter R in Brazilian Portuguese has multiple pronunciations depending on its position in the word,…
Brazilian Portuguese uses the sounds /ʃ/ (like English "sh") and /ʒ/ (like "s" in "measure") extensively,…
Portuguese uses three accent marks to indicate stress, vowel quality (open/closed), and contractions, with…
Brazilian Portuguese extensively uses informal contractions in speech and casual writing, combining…
Portuguese words are classified by which syllable carries the stress, with specific accent rules determining…
Portuguese numbers follow predictable patterns after twenty, but the teens are rebels with unique forms, and…
Portuguese ordinal numbers show position or order, agreeing in gender with their nouns, but Brazilians avoid…
Portuguese tells time using "ser" in the third person with feminine hours and the system is more flexible…
Brazilian Portuguese writes dates in day-month-year order with months lowercase and days as numbers (except…
Questions like onde fica...?, como chego...?, and vou de... are essential for moving around Brazil. They help…
Availability, reservations, times, dates, and practical numbers come up constantly at hotels, airports, and…
Polite requests, prices, and payment chunks cover food, shopping, and everyday purchases in Brazil. Forms…
Simple problem-reporting and help phrases cover closed places, broken things, missing items, and fast…
32 grammar points
The gerund in Portuguese is formed by adding -ando, -endo, or -indo to verb stems, creating forms equivalent…
The present continuous in Brazilian Portuguese combines the verb estar (to be) with gerunds to express…
Brazilian Portuguese strongly prefers gerunds (-ando, -endo, -indo) in many contexts where European…
Describing ongoing actions in Brazilian Portuguese involves multiple structures beyond basic present…
The Pretérito Perfeito expresses completed actions in the past, with regular verbs following predictable…
The most common verbs are irregular in the Pretérito Perfeito, with unique conjugations that must be…
Narrating past experiences involves combining Pretérito Perfeito with sequencing words, descriptive elements,…
Reflexive pronouns indicate that the subject performs an action on themselves, essential for describing daily…
Many common Brazilian verbs appear with reflexive pronouns. Sometimes the pronoun is essential, and sometimes…
Daily routine vocabulary encompasses time expressions, sequence markers, frequency adverbs, and…
Portuguese negation uses "não" before the verb as the basic pattern, but unlike English, allows and often…
Portuguese affirmation goes beyond simple "yes," offering a rich variety of expressions that convey different…
The affirmative imperative in Brazilian Portuguese primarily uses você forms (3rd person singular) for…
The negative imperative in Portuguese uses present subjunctive forms after "não," creating a completely…
Direct object pronouns replace nouns that receive the action of a verb, with Brazilian Portuguese strongly…
Indirect object pronouns indicate to whom or for whom an action is performed, with Brazilian Portuguese…
Proclisis (placing pronouns before the verb) is the dominant pattern in Brazilian Portuguese, occurring in…
Brazilian Portuguese uses pronouns, pro-forms, ellipsis, and reference words to avoid repetition and create…
Demonstratives indicate physical or temporal distance with a three-way distinction (this/that/that over…
Portuguese possessives agree with the thing possessed (not the possessor) and Brazilian Portuguese strongly…
Brazilian Portuguese uses three main structures for weather: estar + gerund for ongoing conditions (está…
Portuguese comparatives use mais/menos + adjective/adverb/noun + do que for formal comparisons, while…
Portuguese superlatives express the highest or lowest degree using two systems: analytical (o/a mais +…
Past time expressions are essential markers that indicate when actions occurred, working hand-in-hand with…
Basic conjunctions connect words, phrases, and clauses in Portuguese, with Brazilian usage favoring certain…
Portuguese frequency adverbs express how often actions occur, with flexible positioning and colloquial…
Adjectives normally agree with the noun in gender and number. This is one of the main patterns that shapes…
Adjectives usually come after the noun, but some can move before it. When that happens, the meaning or tone…
Numbers, words like cada and todo, and quantifiers like algum, nenhum, muito and pouco all help shape the…
Portuguese sentences usually organize information around a subject and a predicate, but word order is…
Brazilian Portuguese often uses ter to mean "there is/there are" in speech. Haver is more formal in this…
Ir + infinitive is one of the most important Brazilian future patterns. It expresses plans, decisions,…
30 grammar points
The imperfect past tense used for ongoing actions, habits, and descriptions in the past.
Using estava with gerund to express actions that were in progress in the past.
Understanding the difference between immediate future (ir + infinitive) and simple future tense.
Using past and future tenses to describe habitual actions and express future intentions.
Formation and usage of the simple conditional tense for hypothetical situations and polite requests.
Brazilian Portuguese employs various strategies for polite requests and suggestions, from conditional verbs…
Understanding when and how to use formal versus informal language and address forms.
The present subjunctive expresses doubt, emotion, desire, or hypothetical situations, formed by switching…
The subjunctive mood expresses subjectivity – wishes, doubts, emotions, and hypothetical situations –…
These three key subjunctive triggers represent different degrees of uncertainty in Portuguese: "talvez"…
Relative pronouns connect clauses by referring back to a noun, with Portuguese using "que" for almost…
Restrictive clauses provide essential information to identify which specific person/thing is meant (no…
Relative pronouns transform choppy, repetitive sentences into smooth, sophisticated discourse by connecting…
Relative clauses serve as information management tools, allowing speakers to efficiently layer details,…
Using "se" to create impersonal constructions that avoid specifying the agent of an action.
Passive se presents the affected thing without naming the agent. It is frequent in signs, ads, instructions,…
Distinguishing between reflexive and impersonal uses of "se" in different contexts.
Advanced connectors for expressing contrast and opposition between ideas.
Portuguese cause/consequence connectors organize logical relationships in discourse, with "já que"…
Portuguese temporal connectors establish precise time relationships between actions, with "quando" marking…
Portuguese indirect speech transforms direct quotes into reported statements using "disse que" for…
Portuguese reported speech traditionally requires systematic tense shifts when converting direct to indirect…
Reported speech in Brazilian Portuguese transforms direct questions into indirect statements using verbs like…
Brazilian sentences often expand around direct objects, indirect complements, and predicative elements.…
Adjuncts add circumstances such as time, place, cause, or manner. Apposition renames a noun, and vocative…
Complex sentences connect clauses in two major ways: coordination joins clauses of the same level, while…
Portuguese uses three major non-finite verb forms: infinitive, gerund, and participle. They help build…
Brazilian Portuguese frequently uses verb combinations to show beginning, continuation, repetition,…
Brazilian Portuguese organizes its pronoun system differently from traditional textbook expectations in…
Mood shows the speaker stance toward the action, while aspect shows how the action unfolds. Seeing both…
29 grammar points
The imperfect subjunctive expresses hypothetical situations, unfulfilled wishes, and polite requests using…
The future subjunctive expresses likely future events after temporal conjunctions like quando, using forms…
The perfect subjunctive combines the present subjunctive of ter/haver with a past participle to express…
Brazilian and European Portuguese diverge significantly in subjunctive usage, with Brazil favoring indicative…
The compound pluperfect uses "tinha" plus past participle to express an action completed before another past…
The future perfect expresses actions that will have been completed by a specific point in the future, using…
The conditional perfect expresses what would have happened in hypothetical past situations, using the…
Aspect in Brazilian Portuguese shows HOW an action unfolds through time (completed, ongoing, repeated, or…
Brazilian Portuguese expresses passive voice through multiple constructions including ser + past participle…
The ter + sido + participle construction creates perfect passive voice in Portuguese, showing that something…
While Portuguese has formal passive voice constructions, Brazilians overwhelmingly prefer active alternatives…
Brazilian Portuguese diminutives go far beyond making things small, expressing affection, irony, politeness,…
Brazilian Portuguese augmentative suffixes -ão, -ona, and -aço don't just make things bigger—they express…
Brazilian Portuguese conditional sentences follow three main patterns for real possibilities (Type 1),…
Mixed conditionals in Brazilian Portuguese combine different time frames between the "if" clause and result…
Brazilian Portuguese offers a rich toolkit of conditional expressions beyond "se" – including caso, a não ser…
Brazilian Portuguese uses hypothetical structures with imperfect subjunctive and conditional tenses to…
Mesoclisis is the insertion of object pronouns into the middle of future and conditional verb forms,…
Clitic climbing is the ability of object pronouns to "climb up" from an infinitive or gerund to attach to the…
Brazilian Portuguese idiomatic expressions are culturally-specific phrases whose meanings cannot be deduced…
Portuguese vocabulary varies dramatically across regions of Brazil and Portuguese-speaking countries, with…
Brazilian humor relies heavily on wordplay (trocadilhos), double meanings (duplo sentido), and cultural…
Brazilian professional communication balances formal Portuguese structures with cultural warmth, requiring…
Agreement ties words together inside the sentence. In more monitored writing, nominal and verbal agreement…
Regency is the preposition pattern a verb, noun, or adjective requires. Crase marks the fusion of a with…
Punctuation and orthography shape readability and register. A few high-value rules make a major difference in…
Valency describes how many and what kind of complements a verb selects. Transitivity is one part of that…
Reduced clauses express time, cause, condition, concession, purpose, or result without a fully finite…
Portuguese can inflect the infinitive for person and number. This personal infinitive is especially useful…
21 grammar points
Noun clauses with subjunctive in Brazilian Portuguese express subjective states of necessity, emotion, and…
When Brazilian Portuguese speakers describe something they're looking for, need, or want but don't know if it…
Brazilian Portuguese uses subjunctive mood in adverbial clauses to express purpose (why something is done),…
Brazilian Portuguese employs subjunctive mood extensively in academic and professional settings through…
Brazilian Portuguese creates sophisticated textual cohesion through anaphoric references (pointing back to…
Brazilian Portuguese manages extended discourse through strategic topic maintenance devices (repetition,…
Brazilian Portuguese academic and professional texts follow specific progression patterns including…
Brazilian Portuguese texts achieve maximum coherence and impact through strategic paragraph architectures…
Sophisticated connectors like contudo (however), outrossim (furthermore), and por conseguinte (therefore)…
The contrastive connectors "ao passo que" (whereas/while) and "enquanto que" (while/whereas) express…
The temporal connectors "tão logo" (as soon as), "assim que" (as soon as), and "mal" (hardly/scarcely)…
Nominalization through suffixes like -ção, -mento, -agem, and -ura transforms verbs and adjectives into…
Advanced nominalization transforms entire verbal clauses into compact noun phrases, converting "quando o…
Academic citation markers "segundo" (according to), "conforme" (as per/in accordance with), and "de acordo…
Mastering register transitions in Brazilian Portuguese means seamlessly shifting between formal and informal…
Brazilian professional communication blends formal competence with personal warmth, creating a unique…
Academic writing in Portuguese requires mastering formal register, impersonal constructions, passive voice,…
Brazilian legal and bureaucratic language, known as "juridiquês" or "burocratês," employs archaic vocabulary,…
Brazilian Portuguese's flexible word order allows speakers to strategically rearrange sentence elements from…
Cleft constructions using "é que," "foi que," and their variants split sentences to spotlight specific…
Portuguese ellipsis strategically omits predictable or redundant elements from sentences, creating elegant…
Portuguese irony, sarcasm, and implicature operate through complex layers of linguistic markers, cultural…
Brazilian Portuguese politeness operates through elaborate linguistic strategies including indirection,…
Brazilian Portuguese communication operates on unwritten cultural codes that transform literal language into…
Free indirect speech in Brazilian Portuguese seamlessly blends narrator and character voices without…
Brazilian Portuguese speakers weave an intricate tapestry of cultural DNA into daily discourse through…
Brazilian Portuguese complex texts orchestrate multiple voices through sophisticated techniques of…
Brazilian Portuguese literary and journalistic writing employs unique techniques from cronismo's poetic…
Mastering the construction and interpretation of ultra-complex noun phrases in sophisticated Portuguese.
Brazilian Portuguese allows modifiers to nest inside other modifiers like syntactic matryoshka dolls,…
Brazilian Portuguese determiners form a complex ecosystem where the choice between…
Register-specific nominal patterns are the systematic ways that nouns, noun phrases, and their modifications…
Brazilian Portuguese encompasses a stunning tapestry of regional dialects that vary in pronunciation,…
Brazilian Portuguese slang operates as a linguistic laboratory where young people, marginalized communities,…
Brazilian Portuguese maintains a treasure trove of archaic forms from Classical Portuguese and Latin that…
Brazilian Portuguese represents one of the world's most dramatic examples of language contact, where Tupi…
Hyperbaton and chiasmus are classical rhetorical devices that manipulate word order and structure to create…
Modern stylistic innovations in Brazilian Portuguese encompass digital-age linguistic creativity including…
Poetic language in Brazilian Portuguese prose employs devices like synesthesia, internal rhyme, metric…
Creative language use and neologism formation in Brazilian Portuguese involves manipulating morphological,…
Brazilian Portuguese leans heavily on two curse stems — foda (from the verb foder) and caralho — that have…
Three of Brazil's most productive curse roots — puta, porra and merda/bosta — almost never carry their…
