Portuguese (Portugal) · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "carne" in Portuguese (Portugal)?

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

carne is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written [ˈkaɾ.nɨ]. It means “meat.” Say 'KAR-nyuh', with a light tapped r in the middle and the final e reduced almost to a whisper — closer to 'nuh' than 'nay'.

Say 'KAR-nyuh', with a light tapped r in the middle and the final e reduced almost to a whisper — closer to 'nuh' than 'nay'.

carne [ˈkaɾ.nɨ]

Stress is on the first syllable car; the r here is a soft tap, not the throaty rr, and the word-final e is barely voiced, shrinking toward a schwa-like [ɨ].

Listen: carne

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Sound it out

car A short 'ah' vowel followed by a single light tap of the tongue for r, like the r in Spanish 'pero'.

n A plain English 'n' as in 'net'.

e Unstressed word-final e in European Portuguese is heavily reduced, almost swallowed — nothing like the clear 'ee' or 'eh' a beginner might expect.

Hear it in a sentence

Não como carne.

I don't eat meat.

Listen: Não como carne.

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Não como carne is a simple negation: não placed directly before the verb como (I eat) turns the sentence negative, the mirror image of English which needs an auxiliary ('I do not eat'). Carne appears without an article here because it names a whole category of food, just as in 'I don't eat meat'.

Where English speakers slip

The biggest giveaway of a foreign accent on carne is over-pronouncing that final e. English speakers, primed by Spanish or by spelling, want to say a clear 'eh' or 'ay' at the end. In authentic Lisbon speech that final vowel almost disappears, landing closer to 'karn' with a faint trailing hiss than to a fully voiced third syllable.