How to form plural nouns in Brazilian Portuguese?

The most common way to form the of a in Brazilian Portuguese is to add an -s at the end of the word — just like English! This general rule is very straightforward and works great for nouns that end in vowels:

But when a noun ends with a consonant, or certain special endings like -ão, you will sometimes need to change the spelling of this ending slightly. There are also some nouns with irregular plurals.

Do you want to know more? In this post, we’ll review the plural endings of nouns ending in vowels and nouns ending in consonants, as well as the plurals of compound nouns. Keep reading this post and become an expert on this topic!

For nouns ending in , just add an -s at the end of the word. See below:

However, this rule does not apply to most words ending in -ão. Keep reading to find out how to make the plural of words like limão(lemon).

For nouns ending in , like mulher(woman), homem(man), and hospital(hospital), the plural form depends on the consonant that the singular nouns ends in. Pay attention here, because instead of adding an -s to the ending of the noun, you may need to add -es, a different ending entirely, or no new ending at all. Let's check out each of these cases now.

To form the plural of compound nouns in Brazilian Portuguese, the plural ending can either be added to all parts of the compound noun or to only one of the words. But how do you know which words should be pluralized? You need to first identify the types of words making up the compound noun, and then you can refer to the following rules:

• Noun + adjective or number + noun:

  Both parts take the plural form.

  Singular	Plural	English
  o cachorro-quente	os cachorros-quentes	the hot dog(s)
  a segunda-feira	as segundas-feiras	the Monday(s)

• Noun + noun:

  Both nouns become plural.

  Singular	Plural	English
  a couve-flor	as couves-flors	the cauliflower(s)
  a palavra-chave	as palavras-chaves	the keyword(s)

• Verb + noun:

  Only the noun changes into the plural.

  Singular	Plural	English
  o guarda-chuva	os guarda-chuvas	the umbrella(s)
  o arranha-céu	os arranha-céus	the skyscraper(s)

• Prefix + noun:

  You might find compound nouns formed by the prefixes pós(post), pré(pre), vice(vice), ex(ex), and contra(against). In cases like these, only the noun is pluralized.

  Singular	Plural	English
  o vice-presidente	os vice-presidentes	the vice president(s)
  o ex-gerente	os ex-gerentes	the ex-manager(s)
  o contra-ataque	os contra-ataques	the counterattack(s)

• Noun + preposition + noun:

  When a preposition is connecting two nouns, like in the word fim de semana(weekend→ lit. end of week), only the first noun takes the plural.

  Singular	Plural	English
  o fim de semana	os fins de semana	the weekend(s)
  a estrela-do-mar	as estrelas-do-mar	the starfish(es)
  o pôr do sol	os pores do sol	the sunset(s)
  a água de coco	as águas de coco	the coconut water(s)

  Tip

  For this last case of compound nouns, we can have nouns with or without a hyphen, as you may have noticed in the examples above.

Let’s review what we have covered about forming the plural of Brazilian Portuguese nouns. We saw that…

• Adding -s is the most common way to form plurals, and this is the general rule for nouns ending in a vowel.

  • For nouns ending in -ão, we drop the -ão and add -ões in most cases. There are, however, a few exceptions in which the plural of these nouns ends in -ães or -ãos.

• Nouns ending in consonants may have different endings:

  • Nouns ending in -r, -s, or -z form their plural by adding the ending -es.

  • If a noun ends in -m, drop the -m and add -ns.

  • If a noun ends in -l, drop the -l and add -is.

  • Nouns ending in -x remain the same, although there are very few nouns that end in -x in Brazilian Portuguese.

• There are some simple, but specific, rules for the plurals of compound nouns, which depend on the combination of nouns, adjectives, verbs, and numbers in the compound word.

Ready to practice forming the plurals of nouns in Brazilian Portuguese?