Learn Portuguese (Portugal): A Beginner's Guide

Portuguese is a Romance language spoken by over 250 million people worldwide, making it a valuable language to learn for travel, business, or personal enrichment. While Brazilian Portuguese is more widely taught, this guide focuses on European Portuguese, specifically for those planning to visit, live, or integrate into Portuguese culture in Portugal.

Why Learn European Portuguese?

Although English is commonly spoken in tourist areas like Lisbon and the Algarve, knowing Portuguese is essential for deeper cultural immersion and daily life. Being able to understand local media and communicate with locals in their language significantly enhances your experience and helps you forge meaningful connections.

Specifically, if you plan to live in Portugal, interacting with public services like hospitals, tax offices (Finanças), and immigration (AIMA) will be much smoother if you speak Portuguese. Many employees in these departments may not be fluent in English, and even if they are, they will appreciate and respond more positively to your efforts to communicate in Portuguese.

Is Tourist Portuguese Enough?

Decide if you want to learn Portuguese or just learn a few phrases to get by as a tourist. If you want to visit a Portuguese-speaking country and have some basic, friendly interactions, you may just want to buy a phrasebook. Learning a language is a big undertaking that takes a good amount of time.

Where to Start: Foundational Elements

Structured Courses

One of the initial mistakes that novice language learners make is that they dive into learning a language without any structure. They learn words and phrases here and there, often from lists of the top words in a language, but they have no idea how to actually construct a sentence. A course that’s structured and geared towards a particular level is the best way to approach learning. Find one you love (or at least don’t hate).

Read also: Learn Forex Trading

Course Recommendations

Practice Portuguese: Very affordable, interactive, and particularly great for audio.
Michel Thomas Method: A great approach for learning how to construct sentences (rather than just memorising phrases). Very interactive.
Pimsleur: Audio-based. Ideal for learning Portuguese on the go (e.g. while walking or at the gym or in the car).
Mimic Method: Mimics classroom style. Very good on grammar.

Grammar Essentials

While some prefer to avoid grammar, understanding its basic structure is beneficial. Instead of lengthy explanations and drills, look for resources with practical examples. For instance, LingQ's free Portuguese Grammar guide is a good starting point. Focus on developing intuition through immersion, as grammar will not be internalized immediately.

Pronunciation

Portuguese pronunciation, especially European Portuguese, can be challenging due to the "swallowing" of vowels and the clipping of word endings. This means that if you learn words by reading, and don’t listen to how they’re pronounced, you are very likely to learn them wrong. Resources like Michel Thomas are great for learning how to structure sentences rather than regurgitate memorised phrases, but there’s actually a lot of value in being able to regurgitate these common words and phrases - particularly in the beginning. And, it’ll boost your confidence too!

Key Resources for Pronunciation

Practice Portuguese: Offers resources to take you all the way from absolute beginner to upper-intermediate.
Portuguese With Leo: Offers a Perfect Portuguese Pronunciation Program to master Portuguese pronunciation and learn how to speak European Portuguese like a native speaker!
50 Languages: This website has hundreds of useful phrases in European Portuguese, complete with audio clips that tell you how to pronounce them.
Vowel Chart: There is a video about vowels and a chart that shows the open, medium, and closed vowel sounds for the different letters.

Vocabulary

A tourist phrasebook will give you all of the words and phrases that you’re likely to need in day-to-day situations, such as at a hotel or at the supermarket. One can use a phrasebook, but also one can use 50 Languages, which offers as much content as the phrasebooks produces like big companies like The Lonely Planet or Rough Guides and it’s free.

Immersion Techniques

Listening and Reading

Immerse yourself in the language through reading and listening. Start with materials suited to your level, such as the Portuguese Mini Stories on LingQ, available in both European and Brazilian Portuguese.

Content Recommendations

Podcasts: Look for podcasts from Portugal.
LingQ: A great tool because it lets you learn directly from interesting, authentic content.
Lyrics Training: A unique app that uses music and song lyrics for language learning.
Portuguese TV shows: There are a handful of Portuguese TV shows that have subtitles in Portuguese.

Engaging with Content

When I started learning Portuguese, I just listened and read things I enjoyed. At first, I didn’t understand much, but that didn’t matter. The rhythm and feel of the language grew on me. I’d look things up when I was curious, then get back to listening.

Read also: Understanding the Heart

Speaking Practice

Language Exchange

The best way to get speaking practice is either with a language tutor or with a language exchange partner, although it’s actually quite difficult to find a European Portuguese tutor who gives good feedback. You may have to try out a few different tutors and perhaps combine this with a language exchange partner as well. HelloTalk is a useful resource for finding native speakers who want to do a language exchange. Similar sites include Tandem.net and MyLanguageExchange.com.

Tutors

In theory, a tutor is the better option as they’ll be better equipped to give you feedback and tell you where you’re going wrong. You’re also better off booking a one-on-one class with a tutor on Italki than you are practicing with the other people in your class.

Real-Life Interactions

Practicing speaking is important in any language but it’s particularly important in European Portuguese because of how key pronunciation is. Take advantage of opportunities to speak with native speakers, even if it's just at the supermarket or café. These interactions, however limited, are valuable.

Setting Goals and Staying Motivated

Learning a new language can be incredibly overwhelming, particularly if you set vague goals like ‘I want to learn to speak Portuguese.’ Instead, decide what you actually want to achieve. Setting attainable daily goals is essential.

Exam Preparation

If your goal is to pass an exam, such as the A2, book the exam for a few months in advance so you really have something to work towards. Knowing that you have the exam booked and paid for will encourage you to study harder.

Read also: Guide to Female Sexual Wellness

Level Progression

If your goal is to get to a higher level, such as B2 or even C1 or C2, set mini milestones. You may want to book in for one exam (e.g. the A2) for six months down the line and then book another exam in another six months.

Avoiding Common Mistakes

Brazilian vs. European Portuguese

A lot of people (and I mean A LOT) make the mistake of downloading Duolingo and trying to learn Portuguese with that. Duolingo teaches Brazilian Portuguese and not European Portuguese. So do Babbel, and Rosetta Stone. Although they are the same language, they are very different-much, much more than, say, American and British English. You could learn Brazilian Portuguese, as it’s understood in Portugal. However, it’s better to focus on Portuguese as it’s spoken in Portugal if you’re moving here or even just visiting. If you focus on Brazilian Portuguese (as Duolingo teaches) you may struggle to understand Portuguese people when they speak to you in the cafes, restaurants, and shops here.

Learning Portuguese as a Spanish Speaker

Spanish and Portuguese, for example, are so similar that we may think we can just pick up a few Portuguese phrases and fake it. Portuguese deserves to be treated as its own language.

Language Learning Tools

Apps

Practice Portuguese: A much better plan would be to focus on an app or service that teaches Portuguese from Portugal. Practice Portuguese, as mentioned, does this and they have an app as well as videos, audio, and a podcast. It’s also incredibly-affordably priced so if you’re interested in an app-based learning approach, this is a good one to start with.
Memrise: Focused on vocabulary building through memorisation techniques, Memrise uses spaced repetition and interactive games to enhance language retention. It also incorporates real-life language use through videos of native speakers.
Drops: Drops is a visually engaging app designed for short, daily language learning sessions.
Pimsleur: Pimsleur offers audio-based language learning, making it suitable for learning on the go. It emphasises oral language skills and conversational practice, making it great for improving speaking and listening proficiency.
Lyrics Training: Lyrics Training is a unique app that uses music and song lyrics for language learning.
Linguno: A fun app that tests you on several things including grammar.

Websites

Conjugemos: Has several games where you can test your ability to conjugate verbs. It’s much more fun than trying to memorise verb tables!
Verbix: A simple verb conjugation tool that covers European Portuguese. Simply enter a verb (e.g. falar - to speak) and it’ll show you the Portuguese for I speak, you speak, I will speak, etc in European Portuguese.

Audio

Pimsleur: This method focuses on building language skills through audio lessons led by an instructor. It encourages learners to construct sentences and grasp linguistic structures intuitively, without rote memorisation or written exercises.
Michel Thomas Method: This method focuses on building language skills through audio lessons led by an instructor. It encourages learners to construct sentences and grasp linguistic structures intuitively, without rote memorisation or written exercises.

Free Resources

It’s understandable that everyone wants to learn a language for free. However, despite the saying that the best things in life are free, when it comes to language learning the best courses and resources are usually paid-for. That said, you don’t have to spend thousands trying to learn Portuguese. Remember, there are lots of free resources for learning European Portuguese as well.

50Languages: Has hundreds of useful phrases in European Portuguese, complete with audio clips that tell you how to pronounce them.
Memrise and Conjugemos: Both available for free.
YouTube: There’s a lot of great content on YouTube that you can watch for free, both in terms of lessons and content from native Portuguese speakers like these videos from Liz Sharma.

The Importance of Listening Practice

Listening practice is important when learning any foreign language but it’s especially important when it comes to learning European Portuguese.

Resources for Listening Practice

Portuguese Podcasts: There are some useful podcasts aimed at language learners that include a transcription.
Portuguese TV shows: There are a handful of Portuguese TV shows that have subtitles in Portuguese.

Time Commitment

Learning a language is hard, despite all of the language courses that promise to teach you a new language in 30 days. And, unfortunately, you won’t learn European Portuguese with just an app - although there are some apps that can complement your language learning. Joel Rendall, who co-runs Practice Portuguese, says students typically take anywhere from a few months to a few years to reach an A2-level of Portuguese. This is the upper-beginner level, and also the required level if you’re planning to apply for Portuguese citizenship. Achieving something closer to fluency will take a bit longer, unfortunately. Portugalist reader, Jonah Salita, was able to reach roughly a C1-level of Portuguese (which is essentially fluency) in 18 months, but this was with him studying for around 3 hours every day.

tags: #learn #portuguese #portugal #for #beginners