Best of Brazil: Differences Between South American and European Portuguese

I get asked, a lot, about the differences between the Portuguese spoken in Brazil and that spoken in Portugal. I usually answer that it is similar between the English of the US and that of the UK. Usually, that answer is sufficient.

But for those whose curiosity goes deeper, the answer is more nuanced than that. Indeed, reducing the Brazilian speech to a monolithic pronunciation would be like ignoring all the differences in pronunciation and usage that exist “from sea to shining sea” in the US. The same can be said for European Portuguese as well, for Portugal, although tiny in comparison to Brazil, as a surprising number of accents and variations.

Yet with all the in-country variations, there are enough common factors to make Brazilian Portuguese immediately distinguishable from its European counterpart, even to the point of being virtually indistinguishable, as Itacyara and I discovered on in our 2001 trip to Portugal.

If you would like to go further down this rabbit trail, here are a few videos that will help you understand the differences, and the reasons why they exist.

First up, a good breakdown on the key characteristics of the two varieties of Portuguese.

Next, some of the differences in vocabulary between the dialects.

Portuguese teachers from Brazil and Portugal discuss the differences between the two languages. In Portuguese, with English subtitles.

So has this crash course in Portuguese piqued your interest to learn more? I’ve put together some articles on language acquisition, which you can read here, here, and here.

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And be sure to read the action-packed adventures of Missionary Max: Missionary Max and the Jungle Princess and Missionary Max and the Lost City.