Portuguese (Portugal) · Pronunciation Guide

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

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

lago is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written [ˈlaɡu]. It means “lake.” Say "LAH-goo", with an open, clear first syllable and the final o clipped to a short "oo".

Say "LAH-goo", with an open, clear first syllable and the final o clipped to a short "oo".

lago [ˈlaɡu]

Stress is on the first syllable LA; the final o is unstressed and reduces to a quick "oo" rather than a full "oh".

Listen: lago

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Sound it out

LA- Stressed and open, like English "la" in "llama", clear and held slightly longer than the rest of the word.

-g- A hard g as in English "go".

-o Unstressed final syllable, reduced to a short "oo".

Hear it in a sentence

Nadámos no lago.

We swam in the lake.

Listen: Nadámos no lago.

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"Nadámos no lago" uses the past tense (pretérito perfeito) of nadar (to swim); note the accent mark on nadámos, which in European Portuguese distinguishes the past tense form from the present-tense nadamos ("we swim") — a written accent that Brazilian Portuguese generally doesn't use for this verb form. No lago again shows the em + o = no contraction.

Where English speakers slip

Beyond the vowel reduction on the final -o (which should stay short, unlike the fuller Brazilian pronunciation), learners should also notice that nadámos carries a written accent in the European standard that changes how the word is stressed compared to the unaccented Brazilian spelling nadamos — a useful spelling-to-sound cue that's easy to overlook.