Learn the Plural in Portuguese – Part 1

In Portuguese, there are several rules to form the plural of the words. It all depends on the word ending or the stressed syllable of each word. We will show you the main rules in a series of posts about this topic.

This first lesson covers:

1. Words that are only used in the plural form
2. Words that are invariable, that is, they do not change when you use them either in the singular or plural form

1. Words that are always used in the plural

There are a few words that are always used in the plural form. You will notice that some of them are also used in the plural form in English.

The articles, pronouns, verbs, and adjectives that refer to these words should be used in the plural as well.

Examples:

• Os óculos de sol/os óculos escuros = sunglasses
• Você viu meus óculos de sol? Estão em cima da mesa. = Have you seen my sunglasses? They are on the table.

• Os óculos = reading glasses
• Mariana perdeu os óculos. = Mariana lost her reading glasses.

• As costas = the back
• Minhas costas estão doendo. = My back hurts.

• As férias = vacation
• Como foram suas férias? Minhas férias foram ótimas! = How was your vacation? My vacation was awesome!

• Os parabéns = congratulations
• Meus parabéns pela promoção! = Congratulations for the promotion!

• Os pêsames = condolences
• Meus pêsames, João. = My condolences, João.

• As olheiras = dark circles, eye circles
• Nossa, estou com olheiras enormes! = Gosh, I have huge dark circles under my eyes!

• Os arredores = surroundings
• Carina mora nos arredores de Curitiba. = Carina lives in the surroundings of Curitiba.

• As Olimpíadas = the Olympic Games
• As Olimpíadas de 2016 serão no Rio de Janeiro. =The 2016 Olympic Games will be in Rio de Janeiro.

 

 

 

Dica Street Smart:

Some words that are only used in the plural form in English will have the singular and plural forms in Portuguese. Here are some of them:

• Scissors = a tesoura/as tesouras
• Não sei onde está a tesoura. = I don’t know where the scissors are. (1 pair of scissors)
• Compramos três tesouras grandes e duas pequenas. = We bought three big scissors and two small ones.

• Pajamas = o pijama/os pijamas
• Preciso comprar um pijama novo. = I need to buy new pajamas.
• Todos os meus pijamas estão sujos. = All my pajamas are dirty.

• Police = a polícia
• A polícia já está no local do crime. = The police are already at the crime scene.
• As polícias do Rio de Janeiro e de São Paulo estão trabalhando juntas para encontrar o criminoso. = The Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo police departments are working together to find the criminal.

• Pants = a calça
• A calça de Carla está rasgada. = Carla’s pants are ripped.
• Essas calças estão muito sujas! = These pants are very dirty!
• Obs: In Portugal, they use “calças” always in the plural

The same rule applies to:

• Panties = a calcinha, as calcinhas
• Pliers = o alicate, os alicates
• Shorts = o calção, os calções
• Tweezers = a pinça, as pinças

2. Words that are the same in the singular and in the plural

Some words do not change when used in the singular or plural form: 

• O pires/os pires = saucer/ saucers
• Francisco quebrou um pires. = Francisco broke a saucer.
• Na verdade, ele quebrou dois pires. = Actually, he broke two saucers.

• O tênis/os tênis = tennis shoes
• Minha mãe me deu um tênis. = My mother gave me a pair of tennis shoes.
• Nossa, você tem muitos tênis. = Wow, you have a lot of tennis shoes.

• O lápis/os lápis = pencil/pencils
• Você tem um lápis para me emprestar? = Do you have a pencil that I can borrow?
• Roseli tem uma coleção com mais de 100 lápis. = Roseli has a collection of more than 100 pencils.

• O ônibus /os ônibus = bus/buses
• O ônibus para Campo Grande está atrasado. = The bus to Campo Grande is late.
• Eu pegava dois ônibus para ir ao trabalho. = I used to take two buses to get to work.

• O atlas/os atlas = atlas
• Fábio levou o atlas do mundo para a aula de geografia. = Fabio brought the world atlas to the Geography class.
• A professora comprou vários atlas da Ásia e África. = The teacher bought several Asia and Africa atlases.

On our next post you will learn about the plural form of words ending in vowels.

Fique ligado! = Stay tuned!

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