Portuguese (Brazil) · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "quando" in Portuguese (Brazil)?

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

quando is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈkwɐ̃.du/. It means “when.” KWAHN-doo. The qu is a real "kw" here, the first vowel is nasal, and the final o raises to "oo."

KWAHN-doo. The qu is a real "kw" here, the first vowel is nasal, and the final o raises to "oo."

quando /ˈkwɐ̃.du/

The "kwan" is loud, unwritten. It's worth pairing with "quanto," which differs by exactly one consonant and follows the identical stress pattern — Portuguese has a small cluster of qu-plus-nasal question words, and they all behave the same rhythmically.

Listen: quando

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Sound it out

quan The u speaks before an a, giving "kw," and the a that follows is nasal. This is the loud syllable and the resonance is unmistakable.

do Hard d, since an o follows rather than an i, coming straight out of the nasal. The o then raises to "oo," so the word ends quietly on "doo."

Hear it in a sentence

Quando começa o jogo?

When does the game start?

Listen: Quando começa o jogo?

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"Quando começa o jogo?" links "começa o" so the final "ah" of the verb runs into the article's "oo." "Jogo" then opens with a soft "zh" and ends with a raised o, so its two o-spellings produce two different sounds within one short noun.

Where English speakers slip

Dropping the w gives "KAN-doo," which misapplies the silent-u rule. Before an a the u is fully pronounced. English speakers also give the n full consonant value and leave the final o unraised — three separate corrections in a two-syllable word. Spanish speakers have "cuando," which handles the w correctly but has no nasal at all.