Portuguese (Portugal) · Pronunciation Guide

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

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

pão is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written [ˈpɐ̃w̃]. It means “bread.” Say a quick nasal 'powng' with no hard 'ng' at the end — the whole vowel is pushed through the nose, like the English 'ow' in 'now' hummed instead of spoken.

Say a quick nasal 'powng' with no hard 'ng' at the end — the whole vowel is pushed through the nose, like the English 'ow' in 'now' hummed instead of spoken.

pão [ˈpɐ̃w̃]

The word has only one syllable, so stress isn't in question; the tilde over the a marks that the entire ão glide is nasalized from start to finish.

Listen: pão

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Sound it out

p Like English 'p' in 'spot' — soft, with no puff of air, unlike the aspirated 'p' that starts English 'pot'.

ão A nasal diphthong sliding from 'a' toward 'w', with air escaping through the nose the whole time — think the 'ow' in 'now' said as if you have a cold.

Hear it in a sentence

Compro pão fresco todos os dias.

I buy fresh bread every day.

Listen: Compro pão fresco todos os dias.

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Compro pão fresco todos os dias uses comprar (to buy) in the everyday present-tense eu form, compro. Pão is masculine, so the adjective fresco takes the -o ending to agree with it. Todos os dias ('every day') is a fixed time phrase that Portuguese speakers naturally tack onto the end of a sentence, not the front as English speakers might expect.

Where English speakers slip

English speakers tend to split ão into two clear vowels ('ah-oo') and forget the nasal quality, landing on something like plain 'pow'. In real Lisbon speech the sound must stay nasal throughout and is often clipped shorter and more compressed than the fuller, more drawn-out ão heard in Brazilian Portuguese, so resist the urge to linger on it.