How to Pronounce 'A Verdade': Portuguese (Brazil) Pronunciation Guide

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

a verdade is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /a veɦˈda.dʒi/. It means “truth.” ah ver-DAH-djee. The r in the middle is breath, the d in the middle is hard, and the d at the end is a "dj."

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

ah ver-DAH-djee. The r in the middle is breath, the d in the middle is hard, and the d at the end is a "dj."

a verdade /a veɦˈda.dʒi/

The default handles it: ending in -e means the second-to-last syllable takes the weight, so "-da-" is loud and no accent is needed. The word is a good drill precisely because that stressed syllable and the unstressed one after it are spelled with the same consonant, and hearing them come out differently is the whole Brazilian palatalization rule in miniature.

Listen: a verdade

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Sound it out

a The feminine article on its own light beat, an open "ah" that runs straight into the v with no pause between them.

ver True v with teeth on lip, closed e, and a syllable-closing r reduced to a rasp of air. The syllable comes out more like "veh" with a scrape than like English "ver."

da Hard d — an a follows, not an i — carrying the stressed, wide-open vowel. This is the peak of the word.

de Same two letters as the syllable before, entirely different sound: the unstressed e raises to i and converts the d to "dj." One word, two d's, two treatments.

Hear it in a sentence

Isso não é verdade.

That's not true.

Listen: Isso não é verdade.

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"Isso não é verdade" drops the article, which Portuguese does when "verdade" works as a predicate — you say something is truth, not the truth. "Isso" has a double s kept unvoiced between vowels, and "não" contributes its nasal diphthong just before the sentence lands on that final "djee."

Where English speakers slip

Learners treat both d's identically, usually as hard English d's, producing "ver-DAH-day." The second one must be "dj" and the vowel after it "ee." The middle r attracts the usual English curl too. Spanish speakers additionally reach for "verdad," which ends in a consonant and has no final syllable at all.