How to Pronounce 'Rápido': Portuguese (Brazil) Pronunciation Guide

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

rápido is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈha.pi.du/. It means “fast.” HAH-pee-doo. That opening r is a throaty h — no trill, no English r.

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

HAH-pee-doo. That opening r is a throaty h — no trill, no English r.

rápido /ˈha.pi.du/

Stressed three syllables from the end, which in Portuguese always means a written accent — there is no default rule covering that position, so words like this, "último" and "médico" must all be marked. Drop the accent and a reader would guess RAH-pi-DO or ra-PI-do instead.

Listen: rápido

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Sound it out

r Word-initial r in Brazil is friction from the back of the throat, close to a firmly pushed English h. Spanish rolls this letter and English curls it; Brazilian Portuguese does neither, and getting it wrong is the loudest possible accent marker.

á The accent pins the stress here and confirms a wide-open a. It's the only loud syllable in a three-syllable word, so give it clear length.

pi Unaspirated p and a short high "ee." Quick and unstressed, tucked between the accented syllable and the ending.

do The d stays hard because an o follows rather than an i, and that o raises to "oo." The word tapers away after its accented opening.

Hear it in a sentence

Esse carro é muito rápido.

That car is very fast.

Listen: Esse carro é muito rápido.

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"Esse carro é muito rápido" pairs two throaty h-sounds in short order: the double rr inside "carro" and the initial r of "rápido." Hearing them back to back is useful, because they are the same sound arising from two different spellings — one from rr between vowels, one from r at the start of a word.

Where English speakers slip

The initial r is the whole battle. Spanish speakers trill it because Spanish "rápido" demands a trill; English speakers produce their own r. Brazilians make it an h. Beyond that, the accent is often ignored in favour of English second-syllable stress, and the final o is regularly left as "oh" instead of raising.