Regular –AR verbs

Understanding the Basics

Every Portuguese verb in its dictionary form ends in -AR, -ER, or -IR. This form is called the infinitive. For -AR verbs, conjugation is like changing outfits – you take off the -AR "outfit" and dress the verb stem in different endings depending on who's doing the action.

The Conjugation Pattern

Let's use FALAR (to speak) as our model:

1. Find the stem: FALAR - AR = FAL-

2. Add the appropriate ending:

EU → -O

• fal + o = falo (I speak)

Daily Conversations

• "Eu trabalho de casa" (I work from home)

• "Você mora sozinho?" (Do you live alone?)

• "A gente conversa todo dia" (We talk every day)

• "Eles não falam inglês" (They don't speak English)

• "Nós caminhamos muito" (We walk a lot)

WhatsApp / Texting

• "chego em 5 min" (I'll arrive in 5 minutes)

• "vc compra o pão?" (will you buy the bread?)

• "a gente conversa dps" (we'll talk later)

Spelling Notes for the Present Indicative

Regular -AR verbs in the present indicative don't have spelling changes — just remove -AR and add the ending. The endings (-o, -a, -amos, -am) all start with a back vowel (o, a), so the stem's final c, ç or g keeps the same sound it has in the infinitive:

• ficar → eu fico, você fica, nós ficamos (no change)

• chegar → eu chego, você chega, nós chegamos (no change)

• começar → eu começo (cedilla stays!), você começa, nós começamos

(Verbs in -CAR, -ÇAR, -GAR do change spelling in other tenses — the preterite "eu" form like cheguei, comecei, fiquei, and the present subjunctive — but you'll meet those later.)

The A Gente Trap

Remember: "a gente" ALWAYS uses 3rd-person singular:

• ✅ "A gente trabalha" (We work)

• ❌ "A gente trabalhamos"

Modern loanwords always become -ar verbs

When English words enter Portuguese as verbs they almost always pick up the -ar ending and conjugate exactly like falar: clicar (to click), deletar (to delete), tuitar (to tweet), escanear (to scan), resetar (to reset). The same is true for nouns that turn into actions, like whatsappear (to WhatsApp). Learning the -ar pattern doesn't just unlock the existing verbs — it's the template every future borrowing will follow.

Sources: Wiktionary — tuitar, Wiktionary — deletar, Wiktionary — clicar.

Among hundreds of -ar verbs, only two are truly irregular

The -ar class is the most uniform of Portuguese's three: only estar (to be) and dar (to give) break the pattern in the everyday tenses, and they're irregular in nearly identical ways. By contrast, the -er and -ir classes between them include ser, ter, fazer, pôr, ir, vir, ver, poder and many more — so once you've nailed the -ar pattern, you've nailed almost the entire class.