Portuguese (Portugal) · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "bom dia" in Portuguese (Portugal)?

Q: How do you pronounce bom dia in Portuguese (Portugal)?

bom dia is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written [bõ ˈdiɐ]. It means “good morning.” bõ DEE-uh — 'bom' is nasalized, rhyming with French 'bon'; 'dia' stresses the first syllable, with a true, crisp 'd' (never 'j').

bõ DEE-uh — 'bom' is nasalized, rhyming with French 'bon'; 'dia' stresses the first syllable, with a true, crisp 'd' (never 'j').

bom dia [bõ ˈdiɐ]

'Bom' carries its own nasal stress as a monosyllable; within 'dia,' stress falls on 'di,' and critically the 'd' stays a clean dental 'd' before the 'i' — it never softens into a 'j'/'dj' sound.

Listen: bom dia

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

Sound it out

bom 'b' as in English, followed by a nasalized 'o' — the vowel is pushed through the nose, similar to French 'bon', not a plain English 'bom'.

di Stressed: a true, sharp 'd' (tongue at the teeth) plus a clear 'ee' — crucially NOT the 'jee'/'dgee' sound Brazilian Portuguese often uses here.

a Unstressed final vowel, reduced to a short, open 'uh' sound, trailing off quickly.

Hear it in a sentence

Bom dia! Dormiste bem?

Good morning! Did you sleep well?

Listen: Bom dia! Dormiste bem?

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

"Bom dia" is used any time before roughly midday and can double as both a greeting and a parting word within that window. "Dormiste bem?" uses the informal "tu" past tense, a friendly, familiar way to ask how someone slept.

Where English speakers slip

The single biggest EP-vs-Brazilian pronunciation difference here is the "di" in "dia": European Portuguese keeps a crisp, true "d" sound, while Brazilian Portuguese famously palatalizes it into a "j"/"dj" sound ("JEE-uh"). Many learners exposed to Brazilian media default to the "j" sound, which is a clear giveaway of the wrong dialect in EP.