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Portuguese (Portugal) · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "telemóvel" in Portuguese (Portugal)?
Say "tluh-MAW-vel" — the first two syllables almost collapse together into a quick "tluh", with the main stress and an open "aw" sound on "MÓ".
Stress falls on "mó" (open "o", as marked by the accent); both preceding unstressed "e"s shrink to a faint [ɨ], often making the whole first half sound like one quick syllable, "tluh".
Listen: telemóvel
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Sound it out
Hear it in a sentence
O meu telemóvel está sem bateria.
My phone has no battery.
Listen: O meu telemóvel está sem bateria.
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"O meu telemóvel está sem bateria" ("My phone has no battery") uses "estar sem" ("to be without") as the natural way to say something lacks or is out of something, here battery. "Telemóvel" is the standard European Portuguese word for a mobile/cell phone; Brazilian Portuguese instead uses "celular", so this word itself is a useful EU-vs-BR marker.
Where English speakers slip
Because the first two syllables reduce so heavily, English speakers who pronounce every vowel clearly end up with an over-enunciated "teh-leh-MOH-vel" that sounds foreign to Lisbon ears. Aim for a quick, blurred "tluh-MAW-vel" where the unstressed vowels are almost swallowed — that heavy reduction of pre-stress vowels is one of the clearest fingerprints of European (versus Brazilian) Portuguese.