European Portuguese pronunciation: a step-by-step starting point

Avoid giving every syllable the same weight. Café has stress on fé, while obrigado has stress on ga. Capitals below are only a practice aid; the ordinary spellings remain café and obrigado.

Listen to the whole word first. Then mark its strongest syllable and say it in a short phrase. A written accent can help, but not every stressed syllable has an accent mark.

Unstressed vowels can be reduced in European Portuguese. Reading each letter with equal force may therefore sound quite unlike the word you hear. Ciberdúvidas also explains exceptions: not every unstressed vowel is closed or reduced.

Do not turn this into a rule to “drop vowels”. Compare one recording with its text and notice that particular word. A new speaker or a different pace may sound a little different.

Nasal resonance belongs to the sound of words such as pão and não. Simply adding a clear English n to an English vowel will not reproduce them. Listen to the whole syllable and try repeating it as one continuous sound.

Use just two or three repetitions at a time. If you are unsure, return to the model rather than repeating the same guess faster and faster.

First, listen without reading. Next, read the text and notice the stressed syllable. Finally, pause, repeat it yourself and listen once more to compare.

Recording yourself may help, but this exercise does not require you to upload anything. Aim for intelligibility rather than copying one person perfectly. The exercise below checks your knowledge of written stress patterns; it cannot assess your spoken pronunciation.