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Pronunciation lab
The sounds that trip people up in Portugal: nasal vowels, swallowed vowels, "lh" and "nh", the "sh" at the end of words, and the two Rs. Pick a sound, watch where the tongue goes, hear it, then record yourself.
A schematic cross-section, lips on the left. It shows where the tongue and soft palate go for each sound. It is a teaching sketch, not an X-ray.
Nasal vowels [ɐ̃]
The soft palate drops and air flows through the nose as well as the mouth. Do not finish with an "n" or "m": the vowel itself is nasal. Say "uh" while pinching your nose. If the sound changes, it is nasal.
Watch out: English speakers add a hard "n": "bom" is not "bon", and "um" is not "oon".
ão, ãe, õe [ɐ̃ → w̃]
These are nasal diphthongs: the vowel glides, and the whole glide stays nasal. "ão" starts open and nasal, then rounds the lips towards "w". Nouns ending in -ão form the plural in -ões (limão, limões), -ães (pão, pães) or -ãos (mão, mãos), so learn the plural with the word.
Watch out: Do not say "ow" like the English word "now". Keep the nose open all the way through.
Swallowed vowels [ɨ]
In European Portuguese, unstressed vowels shrink. Unstressed "e" becomes a short, closed central vowel [ɨ], or disappears. Unstressed "o" sounds like "oo" [u], and unstressed "a" is a short "uh" [ɐ]. The stressed syllable carries the word, and the rest is squeezed.
About the audio. The synthetic voice reduces these vowels less than a Lisbon speaker does (it says the first "e" of "pequeno" almost in full). Trust the IPA, and listen to people around you.
Watch out: Reading every letter at full length makes you sound Brazilian or like a learner. "Pequeno" is closer to "p'KEH-noo".
Open and closed vowels [ɛ → e]
Accents mark real differences. "é" and "ó" are open ([ɛ], [ɔ]); "ê" and "ô" are closed ([e], [o]). Some pairs differ only in this vowel, and a few differ in meaning too.
Watch out: "ela" (she) has an open vowel, and "ele" (he) a closed one. Say them in turn.
lh and nh [ʎ → ɲ]
"lh" [ʎ] and "nh" [ɲ] are made with the middle of the tongue against the hard palate, like the "ll" of "million" or the "ny" of "canyon", but as a single sound. "nh" also sends air through the nose.
Watch out: Do not say "l-h" or "n-h". The tongue touches once and releases.
S, Z, X, J and the "sh" at the end [s → ʃ]
Portugal has more "sh" than Brazil: "s" or "z" at the end of a syllable or word is [ʃ] before a pause or an unvoiced sound, and [ʒ] before a voiced consonant. Between vowels "s" is [z]. "ch" and "x" are usually [ʃ], and "j", and "g" before e or i, are [ʒ].
Watch out: "Dois" (two) is not "dois" with a clean "s": it ends in a "sh" sound. "Português" ends in "sh". "Pasta" is "PASH-tuh". "Casa" has a "z".
The two Rs [ɾ → ʁ]
A single "r" between vowels is a quick tap of the tongue tip [ɾ], as in the American "butter". At the start of a word, after "n", "l" or "s", and for "rr", Portuguese uses a strong back "r" [ʁ] made at the back of the mouth, like a French "r".
Watch out: "Caro" (dear, expensive) and "carro" (car) differ only in the R. A wrong R changes the word.
Record and compare
Choose a word above (now: bom). Play the reference, record yourself saying it, then compare the two pictures. Each shows the sound as colours over time, with low sounds at the bottom and high ones at the top. "S" and "sh" glow high, nasal vowels spread energy lower down. Everything is analysed on your device, and nothing is uploaded.
Train your ear
You hear one word of a pair. Which was it? A few of these differ by one sound, and the wrong one changes the meaning.
About the audio
The recordings are a synthetic European Portuguese voice (Piper "tugão", MIT licence, trained on a CC0 dataset), generated in advance for every word and phrase on this site. It is clear and consistent, but it is a machine: where it sounds odd, trust the IPA and a native speaker. If a recording cannot play, we use your device's speech voice only if it is a pt-PT voice, never a Brazilian one.
Need a quick phrase list instead? tourists.pt has a phrasebook.
European Portuguese (pt-PT). Pronunciations follow Wiktionary's European Portuguese entries and standard dictionaries such as Infopédia and Priberam. Last reviewed 6 November 2026. Not yet reviewed by a native-speaker teacher: it is a learning tool, not a replacement for one. What was checked.