Portuguese (Brazil) · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "a estação" in Portuguese (Brazil)?

Q: How do you pronounce a estação in Portuguese (Brazil)?

a estação is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /a is.taˈsɐ̃w̃/. It means “station (train/bus).” ah iss-tah-SOWNG. Raised initial e, and the -ão diphthong takes the stress.

ah iss-tah-SOWNG. Raised initial e, and the -ão diphthong takes the stress.

a estação /a is.taˈsɐ̃w̃/

End-stressed, as every -ão word is, with the tilde marking nasality alone. The plural "estações" takes the -ões branch, and that -ção to -ções pattern is one of the most productive in the language — informação, nação, situação and hundreds more behave identically.

Listen: a estação

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Sound it out

es Brazilians raise an unstressed initial e toward "i," so this opens "iss" rather than "ess." The s closing the syllable stays a hiss for most speakers.

ta A dry dental t and an open "ah," unstressed. No palatalization here, since the vowel behind the t is an a.

ção The cedilla forces an s before the a, and then the nasal diphthong carries the stress: a nasalized central a gliding into a nasalized w, one beat, stopping mid-resonance.

Hear it in a sentence

Encontro você na estação.

I'll meet you at the station.

Listen: Encontro você na estação.

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"Encontro você na estação" uses the present tense for a future arrangement, which Portuguese does freely. "Encontro" carries two nasals of its own, and "na" is the em-plus-article contraction — so the sentence hums three separate times.

Where English speakers slip

Reading the initial e as "ess" and closing the -ão with an audible g are the two standard errors. Reading the ç as a k is a third. The word also means season as well as station, so "as quatro estações" is the four seasons — context does all the disambiguating.