The charts below show the way in which the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) represents Portuguese language pronunciations in Simple Wikipedia articles. For a guide to adding IPA characters to Simple Wikipedia articles, see {{IPA-pt}}, {{IPAc-pt}} and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation § Entering IPA characters.

Distinction is made between the two major standards of the language—Portugal (European Portuguese, EP; broadly the standard also used in Africa and Asia) and Brazil (Brazilian Portuguese, BP). Neither variant is preferred at Wikipedia, except in cases where a local pronunciation is clearly more relevant, such as a place in Brazil or an individual from Portugal.

National variant differences should be noted with discretion. When there are differing dialectal Brazilian Portuguese pronunciations, the one closest to European Portuguese should generally be preferred, as this guide is intended to help native speakers of other languages.

See Portuguese phonology for a extensive look at the sounds of Portuguese.

Consonants
IPA Examples English approximation
PortugalEP BrazilBP
b b beiço, âmbar, sob about
β cabeça, sobre[1] EP: between baby and bevyBP: about
ð d cedo, idade[1] EP: other

BP: today

d dedo, lenda today
digo, ande, balde[2] EP: today

BP: jig

f fado, café face
ɡ ɡ gato, signo, bingo, guerra again
ɣ fogo, figueira[1] EP: between ago and ahold

BP: again

k cor, dica, quente, kiwi scan
l l lua, alô lot
w mal[3] EP: toll

BP: tow

ʎ lhe, velho[4] million
m mês, somo might
n não, sono not
ɲ nhoque, sonho canyon
p pó, sopa, apto spouse
ʁ ʁ rio, carro, enrascado,[5][6] lingerie French rouge
ɾ r, porto, por favor[5][6][7] EP: latter (GA)

BP: French rouge

ɾ frio, caro, por acaso[6][7] latter (GA)
s s saco, isso, braço, máximo sack
ʃ escola, as portas, dez, texto[8] EP: sheep

BP: sack

ʃ chave, achar, xarope, baixo, sushi sheep
tchau, atchim chip
t tipo, ritmo, ponte[2] EP: stand

BP: chip

t tempo, átomo stand
v vela, livro vest
ʒ ʒ já, gente pleasure
z rasgo, os meus[8] EP: pleasure

BP: zebra

z casa, os amigos, doze, existir zebra
 
Semivowels[9]
IPA Examples English approximation
PortugalEP BrazilBP
j saia, pais you, boy
w frequente, quão, mau, Cauã quick, glow
Stressed vowels
IPA Examples English approximation
PortugalEP BrazilBP
a a alzheimer, Jaime,[10] dá, lámen, àquele father
ɐ falámos, falamos,[11] andaime[10] EP: father

BP: purse (RP)

ɐ falamos, câmera, bug purse (RP)
e abelha, venho, jeito[12] EP: purse (RP)

BP: they

e meto, sê they
ɛ prémio, prêmio EP: set

BP: they

ɛ meta, sé, Émerson,[13] cafezinho set
i si, dia, país, suíço, rainha,[14] diesel see
ɔ ɔ formosa, formosos, avó, somente off
o Antônio, António EP: off

BP: row (GA)

o avô, formoso row (GA)
u rua, lúcido, saúde boot
Unstressed vowels
ɐ ɐ taça, manhã[15] about
a maior, aquele, da EP: about

BP: grandma

a Camões, caveira grandma
ɛ e incrível, segmento[13] EP: access

BP: survey

ɨ semáforo EP: emission

BP: survey

i jure, pequeno,[16] se EP: emission

BP: happy

i júri, meandro, e, doe[17] happy
ɔ o hospital[13] EP: royale

BP: arrow (GA)

u sortudo EP: outlook

BP:  arrow (GA)

u evacuar, boneco,[16] vi-o, voo, frio[17] outlook
 
Suprasegmentals
Stress and syllabification
IPA Examples Explanation
PortugalEP BrazilBP
ˈ João [ʒuˈɐ̃w] (EP, BP) lexical stress
ˌ Vila-Chã [ˌvilɐˈʃɐ̃] (EP, BP) secondary stress
. Rio [ˈʁi.u] (EP, BP) syllable break
Diacritics
◌̃ Chã [ˈʃɐ̃] (EP, BP)[18] nasal vowel
◌̥ devoiced vowel
Other representations
( ) Douro [ˈdo(w)ɾu] (EP, BP) optional sound
  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 In northern and central Portugal, /b/, /d/, and /ɡ/ are lenited to fricatives of the same place of articulation ([β], [ð], and [ɣ], respectively) in all places except after a pause, a nasal vowel, or (for /d/) /l/, when they are stops [b, d, ɡ], not dissimilar from English b, d, g (Mateus & d'Andrade 2000:11). Most often, it occurs only in southern and insular Portugal and in Brazil in some unstressed syllables, generally in relaxed speech, but that is by no means universal.
  2. 2.0 2.1 In most varieties of Brazilian Portuguese, /d, t/ are palatalized and affricated to post-alveolar before high front vowels /i, ĩ/ except for certain dialects of Northeast Region, Brazil, such as Central northeastern Portuguese /d, t/ are more often pronounced as alveolar or dental before high front vowels (/i, ĩ/). Furthermore, the full palatalization of /d, t/ in all positions before /i, ĩ/ (including in most loanwords) is truly complete only in the state of Rio de Janeiro.
  3. Final /l/ is velarized in European Portuguese and along the Brazilian-Uruguayan border.
  4. /ʎ/ has merged with [j] in some dialects of Brazilian Portuguese, such as the Caipira dialect.
  5. 5.0 5.1 The rhotic consonant represented as /ʁ/ has considerable variation across different variants, being pronounced as [x], [h], [χ], [ɦ], [ʀ], [r] etc. See also Guttural R in Portuguese.
  6. 6.0 6.1 6.2 The rhotic consonants /ɾ/ ⟨r⟩ and /ʁ/ ⟨rr⟩ contrast only between vowels. Otherwise, they are in complementary distribution as ⟨r⟩, with /ʁ/ occurring word-initially, after ⟨l⟩, ⟨n⟩, and ⟨s⟩ and in compounds; /ɾ/ is found elsewhere.
  7. 7.0 7.1 The realization of syllable-final ⟨r⟩ varies by dialect but is generally pronounced as an alveolar tap [ɾ] in European Portuguese and some Brazilian dialects (e.g. Rio Grande do Sul state and São Paulo city), as a coronal approximant ([ɹ] or [ɻ]) in various other Brazilian dialects, and as a guttural R in all others (such as the city of Rio de Janeiro and almost all the Northeast). In some Brazilian Portuguese dialects, word-final ⟨r⟩ may also be completely elided in infinitives; e.g. ficar [fiˈka] (no ⟨r⟩ is pronounced as a tap [ɾ] only if it is followed by a vowel sound in the same phrase or prosodic unit: ficar ao léu [fiˈkaɾ aw ˈlɛw]). That is very similar to the linking R used in some accents of English, such as Received Pronunciation or Australian English.
  8. 8.0 8.1 Mostly in Brazil, the fricatives /s/ and /z/ are not palatalized between syllables or coda positions, but there is a strong palatalization of them in some dialects, such as fluminense, northern, recifense, soteropolitan and florianopolitan (coda /s/ merges with /ʃ/ and /z/ merges with /ʒ/). In the carioca dialect (southern coast of the state Rio de Janeiro, including all of Greater Rio de Janeiro, coda sibilants are almost always palatalized ([ʃ, ʒ]), but in most dialects of the northeast region of Brazil, palatalization of fricatives occurs only before stop or affricate consonants (/d, t, dʒ, tʃ/), such in as the word texto [ˈteʃtu].
  9. Intervocalic glides are ambisyllabic, they are part of previous falling diphthongs and they are geminated to next syllable onset. Examples of such pronunciations are goiaba [ɡojˈjabɐ] and Cauã for [kawˈwɐ̃].
  10. 10.0 10.1 Most Brazilian dialects have closed ⟨a⟩ for stressed sequences ⟨ai⟩ before /m/ and /n/. In many dialects it is also nasalized. Many speakers of those dialects, including broadcast media, use open ⟨a⟩ for some words like Jaime and Roraima.
  11. First-person plural past tense in European Portuguese has open ⟨a⟩, and present tense has closed ⟨a⟩. Both conjugated with closed ⟨a⟩ in Brazilian Portuguese
  12. In the dialect of Lisbon, /e/ merges with /ɐ/ when it comes before palatal sounds.
  13. 13.0 13.1 13.2 The "northern dialects" (restricted to North and Northeast Brazil) do not follow the Standard Brazilian Portuguese pronunciation in terms of unstressed vocalism. The standard pronunciations of those vowels are always closed /e, o/, as in "perereca" [peɾeˈɾɛkɐ] and "horário" [oˈɾaɾju], but in those dialects, they are open vowels /ɛ, ɔ/, and the those words are pronounced [pɛɾɛˈɾɛkɐ] and [ɔˈɾaɾju]. That is also true to but to a lesser extent for most speakers from the state of Rio de Janeiro and from the Federal District, as local dialects are also greatly affected by vowel harmony, and the same is true for many speakers from Minas Gerais, Mato Grosso, Goiás, and Espírito Santo. In many cases, the distinction between /ɛ, e/ and /ɔ, o/ are unclear, with a tendency for neutralization to [e̞, o̞] (that happens in almost all of Brazil). Brazilian Portuguese /ẽ, õ/ can also vary between close-mid, mid, and open-mid positions, depending on the dialect, thr speaker, and the word.
  14. There is no diphthong before palatal consonant, so hiatuses are not indicated before /ɲ/ (e.g. rainha /ʁaˈiɲɐ/).
  15. In Brazilian Portuguese, pre-stressed close ⟨a⟩ is obligatory only before /ɲ/ and has a tendency to be raised before other nasal consonants. In many dialects, nasalization is obligatory also before /ɲ/, Leo Wetzels proposes such nasalized dialects have phonemic palatal gemination (e.g. canhoto /kaɲˈɲotu/ [kɐ̃ˈɲotu]). See Consoantes palatais como geminadas fonológicas no Português Brasileiro*
  16. 16.0 16.1 In words such as "perigo" [pɪˈɾiɡu] and "boneco" [bʊˈnɛku], for example, vowels ⟨e, o⟩ pre-stressed syllables may be pronounced, respectively, as [ɪ, ʊ] in some varieties of Brazilian Portuguese, instead of [i, u].
  17. 17.0 17.1 Some of the post-stressed high vowels in hiatuses, as in frio ('cold') and rio ('river'), may vary between a reduced vowel [ˈfɾi.u] and a glide [ˈfɾiw], exceptions are verbal conjugations, forming pairs like eu rio [ˈew ˈʁi.u] (I laugh) and ele riu [ˈelɨ ˈʁiw] (he laughed).
  18. Nasal vowels in Portuguese are /ɐ̃/, /ẽ/, /ĩ/, /õ/ and /ũ/

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