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Portuguese (Brazil) · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "ir" in Portuguese (Brazil)?
EE with a breath after it — almost just the vowel. It's the shortest infinitive in the language.
Nothing to place: a single stressed vowel with a breath after it. The oddity lies elsewhere. This verb's conjugated forms descend from a completely different Latin root, so vou, vai and fui share no letters at all with the infinitive, and recognizing "ir" in the wild depends on knowing them separately.
Listen: ir
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Sound it out
Hear it in a sentence
Quero ir ao cinema.
I want to go to the movies.
Listen: Quero ir ao cinema.
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"Quero ir ao cinema" places two vowel-heavy syllables next to each other, "ir ao," and Brazilians glide straight through: "ee-ROW." The r actually strengthens into a tap here because a vowel follows it, which is a nice demonstration that the r's pronunciation depends on what comes next, not on the word it belongs to.
Where English speakers slip
English speakers say "ear" or "ur," both with a curled American r that has no place in Portuguese. The other issue is that "ir" plus an infinitive is how Brazilians actually express the future — "vou comer" rather than "comerei" — so learners who drill the synthetic future tense end up sounding formal and bookish in ordinary conversation.