This page outlines days, weeks, months and years in Brazilian Portuguese.
Days of the week in Brazilian Portuguese
Before learning the days of the week, you may want to refresh your memory about numbers in Brazilian Portuguese. The weekdays start with ordinal numbers (second, third, fourth, etc), followed by ‘feira’, which translates to ‘fair’ (e.g. segunda-feira = Monday). The origins of the use of ordinal numbers for weekdays in Portuguese followed by ‘feira’ can be seen here. As with other Catholic countries, Sunday is considered the first day of the week, which explains why Monday is ‘segunda-feira’ (second fair). Saturday (sábado) and Sunday (domingo) are the only days that do not follow the pattern of ordinal number followed by ‘feira’.
Unlike in English, days of the week are not capitalised unless they come at the beginning of a sentence.
See below for the translations of days of the week in Brazilian Portuguese:
Sunday | domingo |
Monday | segunda-feira |
Tuesday | terça-feira |
Wednesday | quarta-feira |
Thursday | quinta-feira |
Friday | sexta-feira |
Saturday | sábado |
Weekdays are feminine and weekend days are masculine. The easiest way to remember this is by looking at the letter that the word ends in:
Next Thursday | próxima quinta-feira |
Next Sunday | próximo domingo |
See here for more information about grammatical gender in Brazilian Portuguese.
To form the plural of weekdays, add an ‘s’ to both parts of the word (e.g. ‘quartas-feiras’ = Thursdays).
In Brazil, it is common for people to drop the word ‘feira’ when speaking informally and simply say “segunda”, ‘‘terça’’, etc.
See below for translations of common vocabulary related to days of the week:
week | semana |
weekend | fim-de-semana |
weekdays | os dias da semana |
fortnight | quinzena |
weekly | semanal |
monthly | mensal |
annual | anual |
Months of the year in Brazilian Portuguese
The months of the year in Brazilian Portuguese are similar to their English translations, so it is quite easy to memorise them:
January | janeiro |
February | fevereiro |
March | março |
April | abril |
May | maio |
June | junho |
July | julho |
August | agosto |
September | setembro |
October | outubro |
November | novembro |
December | dezembro |
As with days of the week, months of the year are not capitalised unless they come at the beginning of a sentence.
The singular word for month is ‘mês’ and the plural is ‘meses’.
Years in Brazilian Portuguese
As with days of the week, you may want to refresh your memory about numbers in Brazilian Portuguese when referring to years.
The full number is used when referring to a particular year:
1975 | mil novecentos e setenta e cinco |
2008 | dois mil e oito |
See below for common vocabulary related to years:
year | ano |
decade | década |
century | século |
millenium | milênio |
Days, weeks, months and years falshcards
Test your understanding of days, weeks, months and years vocabulary using the flashcards below. Click on the card to reveal the translation and the arrows to move between questions:
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