Formation of gerund: –ando, –endo, –indo

The construction estar + gerund describes an action in progress. Learn one little ending and estudo ("I study") becomes estou estudando ("I'm studying"), chove turns into está chovendo, and your Portuguese stops sounding like a textbook and starts sounding alive. Better still, it's one of the easiest things in the language: three endings, almost no exceptions, and the same form for everybody — no agreement, no drama.

Three endings, almost no exceptions

Forming the gerund is one of the tidiest jobs in Portuguese: take the verb, drop the infinitive ending, and add an ending based on the verb group.

That's the whole rule — estudar → estudando, beber → bebendo, dormir → dormindo — and the form never changes for person or number.

Happening right now

• Estou trabalhando em casa hoje. (I'm working from home today.)

• O bebê está dormindo. (The baby is sleeping.)

• O que você está fazendo? (What are you doing?)

• Eles estão assistindo televisão. (They're watching TV.)

Still going on

• O telefone fica tocando. (The phone keeps ringing.)

• O preço continua subindo. (The price keeps going up.)

• Ele anda dormindo mal. (He's been sleeping badly lately.)

Two things at once

A preference, not an absolute Brazil–Portugal split

Brazil commonly uses estou falando ("I’m speaking"); many European varieties commonly use estou a falar. The gerund is also used in Portugal, with regional differences. Practise estar + gerund for the Brazilian model in this lesson.

The intended meaning matters

For simple knowledge and possession, these are common models:

• Eu sei. (I know.)

• Tenho um carro. (I have a car.)

This does not make estou sabendo or progressive constructions with ter universally wrong: they can express other situations or meanings in context. Estou tendo um carro is not the usual model for simply saying “I have a car”.

A position versus the action of moving into it

Use the participle for an established body position:

The term gerundismo refers to criticized gerund uses that add unnecessary continuity, often in customer-service formulas such as vou estar transferindo a sua ligação ("I’ll be transferring your call"). For a simple promise, vou transferir can be more direct. The gerund is correct, and vou estar fazendo can also be appropriate when the context describes an action in progress in the future: counting three verbs does not by itself establish an error.

Sources: Ciberdúvidas, USP