As mentioned, verbs are split into three groups:
Now we’ll deal with the 3rd and final group: -IR verbs!
IR Verb Endings
The regular -IR verb conjugations are almost the same as the -ER verbs, except for one little difference… can you spot it? 🤔
Indicativo
Ela abre a garrafaShe opens the bottle
- eu abroI openindicativo > presente tu abresyou sing.,inf. openindicativo > presente ele / ela abrehe / she opensindicativo > presente você abreyou openindicativo > presente nós abrimoswe openindicativo > presente eles / elas abremthey openindicativo > presente vocês abremyou openindicativo > presente
Indicativo
Nós dividimos todas as refeiçõesWe share all the meals.
- eu dividoI shareindicativo > presente tu dividesyou sing.,inf. shareindicativo > presente ele / ela dividehe / she sharesindicativo > presente você divideyou shareindicativo > presente nós dividimoswe shareindicativo > presente eles / elas dividemthey shareindicativo > presente vocês dividemyou shareindicativo > presente
Indicativo
ela parte o coposhe breaks the glass
- eu partoI leaveindicativo > presente tu partesyou sing.,inf. leaveindicativo > presente ele / ela partehe / she leavesindicativo > presente você parteyou leaveindicativo > presente nós partimoswe leaveindicativo > presente eles / elas partemthey leaveindicativo > presente vocês partemyou leaveindicativo > presente
Did you find it?
That’s right… the “nós” conjugation is different!
- Beber: nós bebemos
- Abrir: nós abrimos
Otherwise, the conjugations are the same. The regular endings for -IR verbs are -o, -es, -e, -imos, -em.
Here are a few more verbs that will all be conjugated with the same endings:
Comments
I would have liked to hear the pronunciation of Abrir, dividir, and partir
Great suggestion, thanks! As a quick solution, I’ve added the infinitive verbs with audio above each verb block. Welcome aboard as a new member this month too! 🙂
Just click on the blue loudspeaker at the top behind the verb as with the other ones!
Thank you mathgeuyen, When I posted this original comment on August 8, 2019, the “blue loudspeaker” was not present. This is one of the things (among many) I like about Practice Portuguese, when you make a suggestion or a request they really listen to you, evaluate your suggestions, and make changes accordingly. Thanks to my suggestion, and possibly others who have suggested the same, you now have the “blue loudspeaker” button present. Before, you could only access the pronunciation by opening up and working on the verb cards.
Obrigada, Joel for taking my suggestion–I appreciate it!
Yup, we added this based on your suggestions! Ongoing feedback helps us make the platform better. By being a small company, we’re often able to act quickly on your feedback, (especially they are minor tweaks). We don’t always get around to properly announcing these more minor changes, but they’re happening continuously.
Very helpful suggestions and changes!
Wonderful! This is great to know.
Joel, The changes haven’t gone unnoticed by me, I appreciate it. The comment by mathgeuyin gave me an opportunity to share this with others who may not know this. I fill out endless surveys, provide feedback when requested, and have made countless queries to many online services I have subscribed to or use–I always get the canned response of “we appreciate/value your input” but I rarely do I see a company or service willing to take action on any of my input. My personal motto is, “it doesn’t have to be my idea to be a good idea.” I wish you continued success and fortune with Practice Portuguese!
i love learning on this website!
Love the enthusiasm, Jessi. Thank you for your comment!
I don’t get the pronunciation of “-em”.
(The same with “eles”.)
How can I solve this?
Hi Mario! Do you mean the audio won’t play? Or that you don’t understand how to pronounce it? (There is no audio for “eles” in this learning note, but the verb conjugations that end in “-em” should be working. Send us an email if those aren’t working for you.)
If it’s a pronunciation issue – check out the personal pronouns section of this learning note to hear the pronunciation of “eles”: Portuguese Verbs. You can play it over and over and compare it to “elas” to try and get that pronunciation down.
As for the “-em” ending, keep in mind that you don’t pronounce the “m” sound. Instead, it’s more like a nasalized vowel, slightly similar to the sound of “ng” in an English word like “thing”. Keep playing the audios above for the conjugations that end in “-em” and see if you can mimic the sounds. I hope that helps!
Thanks! When I speak to the microphone I often get 1% correct even after relistenings and repetitions. That’s embarassing but I don’t know why!
I think tricks like “final m is pronounced like ng” can help a lot. But I don’t know if I get more percentages.
Let’s see.
Check out this guide we posted about those speaking practice questions: Speaking Practice Help. There are lots of factors that go into the percentage, which are often technical and not your fault! 😉
This is so helpful, thank you !
Hi! I am super confused with pronouncing the M at the end of the word.
So for the words that end in M, you don’t really pronounce the M. Instead, you are basically nasalizing the final vowel. At the end of the word, try bringing your mouth to the position it would be in for the sound “ng” in an English word like “thing”. This is a rough way to think of it, but it can be helpful for English speakers to get closer to the pronunciation. Use the audio examples above that end in -em to help you practice hearing and mimicking the final sound.
This is fantastic! I also love how simple Portuguese conjugations are! I should probably not get too carried away, as this is just the present tense, but so far so good. And this learning platform is exceptional quality! Well done 🙂
Ahah, just wait for the other tenses! Thank you so much for your comment, Tom 🙂
Just another suggestion. When you click on the verb to do the quiz and then finish, it would be good to have a link to go back to the unit you were in, instead of only a link to the verb page. I have to click on Learn -> Units and select the unit again to get back onto the unit page. Thanks!
Thanks for the feedback on this! To get back to the Learning Note, you can also just click the “back” button in your browser at the end of the quiz. 🙂
Just like to say pronounciation of they verbs is very difficult such as partem and dividem
Oh, yes, Portuguese has lots of tricky sounds. With those verbs, I suppose the trickiest part is the ending -em sound, which is nasal, like the English -ng sound. If it helps, you can think of the English sounds -aim or -ain as a starting point (as if you were saying partaim, dividaim) and from there, add that bit of nasality at the end (without closing off your mouth completely) and sliightly open the “A” more towards an “UH”. I hope this makes some sense! 😀
This program keeps getting better and better. I aggressively pushed through all of the units last year. Then the video’s and this year the pod casts. There is a huge amount of material. While reviewing with the flash cards, I have noticed that while I understand, I am often not able to come up with the sentence. I have decided to go back and review the units. I love the updates and am getting through the material in a fraction of the time it initially took. Thank you for putting this great program together!!
That’s great! Thank you so much for the kind words. Yes, the flash cards are definitely tough because they force you to produce the language with no help. I think you’ll find it’s a good challenge for moving from “knowing” the language to “using” the language. It’s a great idea to go back and review. That will really help to solidify what you’ve learned and then you can continue to make progress toward producing/understanding more independently. Sounds like you’re on the right track! 🙂
There is nothing like kicking off your shoes and sitting down to a good dose of European Portuguese with Joel and Rui! Love you guys!
This is so helpful, thank you !
My first post. I am loving and learning SO MUCH. Very well presented lessons, and wonderful sequence. THANK YOU ! (And thank you Nick from Algarve for recommending this site!)
I don’t think I am the first to offer this thought, but I would love to hear each pronoun with the verb, instead of just the verb.
First, to make sure I am saying the “Eu” and “você” correctly. But also to reinforce the pronoun and verb going together.
Anyway, hello to all my fellow learners, and BIG THANK YOU and BOM DIA to those running this exceptional site.
Adeus !
Thanks so much for all the kind feedback! 😊
Olá! Just joined and loving everything so far. Just wanted to let you know that “insister” is missing an audio pronunciation in the app and on the website. Keep up the great work! Obrigado!
Just added, thank you!
I agree with Ken above. I would love to hear the pronouns with the verb conjugation just to reinforce those pronouns again and again.
I recommend making a video on nasal vowels and showing learners how to produce such sounds.
Since I started this course, I have come across many words ending in em, which kind of sounds like the en sound in enthusiasm.
Since I speak French and it has nasal vowels, I would at least hope to master its Portuguese equivalents – So far this suppostion does not hold true.
That’s a great suggestion!
We’ll take into account for future videos.
Until then, notice that the -em sound is very simple but unique. If you can’t find an exact correspondence just stop comparing it to other sounds so you don’t get even more confused.
🙂
First of all, thank you for your great explanations throughout this course, I’m really enjoying learning Portuguese with your unique method!
Regarding the verb “abrir” above, it seems that the pronunciation of the first “a” changes between “abro” and “abrimos”.
I noticed a similar change when you introduce the simple past using the verb “olhar “, where there is a subtle difference between the pronunciation of the “o” in “olhei” versus “olhaste “
In those cases, would it be possible for you to point out when the pronunciation changes, and perhaps include the phonetic spelling? I tried to find the phonetic spelling online but most dictionaries default to Brazilian Portuguese, where the pronunciation seems to be rather different.
Olá! Obrigado pelo comentário 🙂
The vowel pronunciation in verbs changes according to where the stressed syllable is. In “abro”, the stress is on the first A, which is why it sounds more open than in “abrimos”, where the stress is on ‘-bri-‘. For “olhar”, the Os of “olha”/”olhas”/”olham”/”olhem” are stressed and must be clearly open, but for other conjugations, some flexibility is allowed and you might notice fluctuating pronunciations from native speakers, where some always keep those Os open, others generally close them a bit when unstressed and others mix it up (without even noticing!). Feel free to just stick to one form in that particular case.
We try to add audio examples extensively throughout the website precisely to help people be aware of the pronunciation of each word and their possible variations. Your suggestion for extra indications is noted, though. The phonetic spelling can also be helpful to sort things out, but at the time, adding it to our examples would be quite a big project for our small team, with the added factor that very few people know the IPA symbols. In any case, we do include some IPA in the pronunciation Learning Notes for individual sounds:
Consonants
Vowels
Thank you so much for the thorough and helpful reply, much appreciated!
Mentir….. does that mean to tell an untruth, or to lie down, or both?
Mentir means to lie, as in not telling the truth, telling lies/untruths.
Really enjoying this course. You have done a great job
Just wondered why there are so few comments from 2023. Have people stopped using the site? Or stopped commenting? Or is it because the things that need to be commented on have already been covered?
We continue to have a growing number of members, so I can’t say for sure. I suppose this particular Learning Note is relatively short, so there’s not as much need for discussion. Like you said, many things have already been covered, so as time goes on it’s expected that there will be fewer new questions to address. It’s also possible that some people are reaching out directly with questions, instead of posting a comment.
Love the app, thank you! Could you please explain the pronunciation of “nos” (we)? Sometimes it’s “nos”, other times it’s “nozh”. Does that depend on whether the next word starts with a vowel or consonant? I also don’dully understand when “s” is pronounced as “sh” and when it’s just “s”
Good question! In connected speech, the ending “s” sound in nós / nos could be pronounced like z or sh or zh, depending on the context. Basically, it tends to sound like z before a vowel, sh at the end of a word by itself, and either sh or zh before a consonant. More detailed rules about pronouncing s can be found here: How to Pronounce S in Portuguese
Take a look and let us know if we can clarify anything!
Also, I just wanted to briefly point out the difference between nós and nos. Nós has an open o vowel and this is the subject pronoun for we/us. Nos has a more closed o vowel, and this is the object pronoun.
Shouldn’t “Eu divido o dinheiro translate into “I share the money” instead of I divide the money? Or are the following translations wrong?
Olá. The verb accepts different translations (share, split, divide). In any case, I’ve just updated that sentence’s translation, for consistency and also for a more idiomatic result 🙂 Thanks for catching that!
I haven’t been a member long but am feeling more accomplished with your lesson plans than I did after a year with “another online program.” I switched because I found out that the whole time I was learning Brazilian Portuguese and I’m glad I did as I plan to emigrate to Portugal for retirement. Pronunciations are very different and your question answers at end of lessons have been invaluable. Keep them up please.
Your feedback is really appreciated – thank you! And feel free to reach out whenever you need.
I’ve noticed that the ‘e’ sound in abrem, dividem, etc. sounds different to that in abres, divide, etc.
I think that they are both the final syllable and should be unstressed. Have I got that wrong or have I missed some rule?
Olá 🙂 In words such as ‘abrem’ and ‘dividem’, the E is part of a nasal diphthong, which is why it sounds different. The ending M is there to mark it – we don’t actually articulate this consonant at the end (i.e. the lips don’t come together to form it), but it signals to us that we should nasalize the preceding vowel. An ending -em should sound just like -ãe (as in ‘mãe’).