Learning Portuguese-English cognates is a great way to build vocabulary fast! It’s basically using what you already know to get a jump-start.
Cognates are simply words that are very similar in both languages, usually due to a common root. We talked about them in our guide to European Portuguese Shortcuts, as well as our video about 5000 Words You Already Know.
Below, you can explore some of the typical spelling patterns for English → Portuguese cognates, with examples for each one. Remember that these patterns do not apply every time. But they are a convenient way to help you notice more cognates as you continue to learn European Portuguese! (If you’re feeling bold, you can use these patterns to take a guess if you forget a word mid-conversation… 😉 )
*usually feminine
ph → f
o telefonetelephone a farmáciapharmacy o alfabetoalphabet
th → t
o teatrotheatre a atletaathlete matemáticomathematics
-tion → -ção*
ficçãofiction opçãooption situaçãosituation
-sion → -são*
exclusãoexclusion decisãodecision agressãoaggression
-ty → -dade*
sociedadesociety responsabilidaderesponsibility comunidadecommunity
-ism → -ismo
racismoracism turismotourism organismoorganism
-ist → -ista
artistaartist ortodontistaorthodontist otimistaoptimist
-ous → -oso / -osa*
nervosonervous(masc.) curiosacurious(fem.) famosafamous(fem.)
-ble → -vel
responsávelresponsible memorávelmemorable favorávelfavorable
add -o, -a*, or -e
modernomodern gráficagraphic importanteimportant
-ary / -ory → -ario / -aria* / -orio / -oria*
categoriacategory dicionáriodictionary alegoriaalegory enfermariainfirmary
-ate → -ato / -ata* / -ado / -ada* / -ar
privadaprivate validarvalidate imediatoimmediate
-cy → -cia*
agênciaagency advocaciaadvocacy fluênciafluency
-age → -agem*
coragemcourage a percentagempercentage
-ly → -mente
alfabeticamentealphabetically exatamenteexactly precisamenteprecisely
-fy → -ficar
identificaridentify classificarclassify justificarjustify
-ance / -ence → -ância*, -ência*, -ênça*
importânciaimportance licençalicense correspondênciacorrespondence
-al and -ar
nacionalnational originaloriginal nuclearnuclear particularparticular
-ize → -izar
(-ise for British English)
normalizarnormalize socializarsocialize organizarorganize autorizarauthorize
Portuguese-English Cognates in Action!
Can you guess the meaning of the words in bold?:
See what we mean? 😎
If you want a more difficult challenge, try listening to this “Shorty” episode. Can you understand some of the words?
“False” Portuguese-English Cognates
Watch out for false cognates, though! As you’ll find out in this next episode, there are some words that seem like cognates, but actually have a different meaning! 🙈
Which other Portuguese-English cognates have you learned?
Comment below! Feel free to share cognates from languages other than English, too. 🙂
Officina with office
Assistir with assist
Oficina usually refers to a mechanic’s workshop / garage / repair shop. Office is escritório. Yes, assistir could mean to assist, but it also sometimes means to watch, so just keep an eye on the context.
I thought that ‘particular’ in Portuguese meant ‘private’ in English not particular.
Olá! It can mean both, depending on context 🙂 For example:
– Tenho um carro particular e um carro da empresa -> I have a private car and a company car
– Gostas de algum objeto em particular? -> Do you like any object in particular?
your -ize words:
organize, authorize, specialize, normalize, socialize, internalize
The correct spelling in the UK is with an -ise. We wouldn’t spell these words with an -ize, not if you want to spell them correctly. e.g.
organise, authorise, specialise, normalise, socialise, internalise
-ize is very American. Only exceptions I can think of are:
anaesthetize, tranquillize – strange how these two words have the same outcome!
Mostly people assume american english, not british english.
That’s like saying most people assume Brazilian Portuguese not Portuguese Portuguese! It’s all in the name “English” from England
I just wanted to jump in and clarify — we (generally) default to Canadian English spellings in our content. This is because one of the owners is Canadian, and because a larger number of our members are from North America. We added a note “-ise for British English” under that section.
In this case, the Canadian English spelling matches the American English spelling. In other cases, sometimes Canadian English matches the British English spelling.
Exactly – it’s really frustrating – why can’t we leave the American english to Duolingo!
Jumping in here, I have to agree with and reiterate Molly’s response from January. We’re heavily biased with me (Canadian) as a cofounder. Compared to Duolingo and other platforms, we probably don’t even have 1% of their resources, as we are just a few hardworking team members, with the only focus being to serve the European Portuguese learning community the best that we can. We don’t have a dog in the fight of which variant of English is best to use, as we don’t have any experts on staff covering the politics or history of the English language. We work much harder on the accuracy of our European Portuguese materials.
Logically or not, I’ve always considered Canadian English to be a bit a compromise between American and British English, since we share many spelling differences with the Brits, and a lot of vocabulary with the US. Many more users on our platform are North American, and with the prominence of American English in the media, I gather Brits as well as non-native English speakers understand most or all of the North American vocabulary that we use on the platform.
The opposite might not be true, if we were to adapt everything to British English. With the resources we have to dedicate to more impactful goals, we won’t offer 2 variants of English, especially when our platform isn’t already localized into other languages like Spanish, Chinese, German etc. Our priority is to teach European Portuguese and have as many users learners the explanations and translations, worldwide. Next time you see an extra U or Z in the spellings of a word, think of me and be glad I didn’t let us go all-in with American spellings (much to Molly’s constant dismay)!
We’re grateful for your understanding and continued support 🙂
Sometimes I wonder if users think we are a much larger company. I suppose it is a compliment to our team doing a pretty good job, if we’re being directly compared to billion dollar companies 😆
It’s a common misconception that -ize forms are purely American and have no place in British English. The Oxford English Dictionary has been listing “organize” as the standard spelling since 1425 (!). The OED team suggests that the comparatively recent adoption of -ise in British English was a reaction against the American spelling convention that became established in the 19th century. Both forms are valid in the UK, although -ise is more common nowadays.
https://web.archive.org/web/20190511201933/https://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2011/03/28/ize-or-ise/
When reading Portuguese I think about possible French cognates as it has more similarities with Portuguese. Your text about cognates starts with « É incrivel » which led me to the French «inscrire » which is a false friend and it did not make sense in that sentence. I had to use the translator to understand that it means « incredible ».
So I’ve learned to check for English cognates whenever no French ones make sense in a given context which means even more possible cognates!
Obrigado.
Lester
In this lesson you have ‘o matemático’, but isn’t the noun ‘a matemática’? ‘matemático’ / ‘matemática’ are adjectives, are they not?
Matemática is the noun for the Math science.
Matemático or matemática can either be an adjective or a noun, as the person versed in mathematics.
Thanks for clarifying, that makes sense!
constipação
I was at the pharmacy getting cold medicine and the pharmacist told me, in English, that the medicine was for flu & constipation. At first I thought it was some weird cold medicine, until I looked it up and found that constipação is congestion!
It would be nice to add at least one optional lesson for non-English cognates. It would be good to illustrate principle, not a specific words.
I have a list of what I call “cross-language homonyms” : different meaning but the same pronunciation (use it for fun discussions with friends)
As an American I have no trouble with the spelling of English words. Our friends to the North(Canada) spell some words differently than we do but it is not an issue for me. By the way I’ve found Practice Portuguese punching above its weight class as far as quality and ease of use. The big corporations may have more resources but your organization brings more passion and better customer service! Well done folks.