Portuguese (Portugal) · Pronunciation Guide

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

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

de is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written [dɨ]. It means “of.” Rhymes roughly with English 'duh', using the short, central 'uh/ih' vowel typical of EP unstressed e's — not 'day' or 'dee'.

Rhymes roughly with English 'duh', using the short, central 'uh/ih' vowel typical of EP unstressed e's — not 'day' or 'dee'.

de [dɨ]

Always unstressed; the 'e' reduces to the characteristic European Portuguese [ɨ] sound, a vowel with no real English equivalent, somewhere between 'ih' and a swallowed 'uh'.

Listen: de

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Sound it out

d A true dental 'd', made with the tongue tip touching the back of the upper teeth — crisper than the English 'd'.

e Reduces to [ɨ], a short, central, almost-silent vowel — nothing like the 'eh' or 'ee' an English speaker expects from the letter e.

Hear it in a sentence

Isto é o livro de Maria.

This is Maria's book.

Listen: Isto é o livro de Maria.

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'Isto é o livro de Maria' uses 'de' to show possession, similar to the English 's in 'Maria's book' but expressed as 'the book of Maria.' This of-construction is the standard way to show possession in Portuguese, since there's no apostrophe-s.

Where English speakers slip

English speakers often give 'de' a full, clear vowel, like 'deh' or 'day'. In natural EP speech, it's reduced almost to nothing — closer to a quick 'd' with a puff of a vowel than a full syllable. Brazilian Portuguese keeps a clearer 'dji' quality here in casual speech, so if your ear is tuned to Brazilian audio, EP's clipped version can catch you off guard.