Three Things I Learned from Learning Portuguese

The Little Details That Make Portuguese What It is

Feb 28, 2026

Olá a Todos! | Hello Everyone!

The Letters Portugal Lived Without

Early on, before I even moved to Portugal, I learned that the Portuguese alphabet once had only 23 letters. It confused me at first. Back then, the Portuguese alphabet looked just like English at a glance, but when I actually counted the letters as it was, I realized it was true. The missing ones? K, W and Y.

So, is the Portuguese alphabet made up of 23 letters or 26?

Portuguese comes from Latin, and Latin barely used K, didn’t have W, and used Y only in Greek-based words like hydro, hygiene and hysteria before modern Portuguese replaced the Y with an I. As Portuguese evolved from Latin, those three letters simply never became part of the standard alphabet because they weren’t common or necessary.

What really caught my attention, though, was how Portuguese handled foreign words that used those missing letters. Instead of changing its spelling rules, it changed the words themselves to fit the Portuguese language. Dictionaries even offered Portuguese-adapted versions of foreign words to keep everything uniform:

kilogram was written as → quilograma
whisky → uísque
ketchup → catchupe
yogurt → iogurte
hysteria → histeria

Even New York was often written as Nova Iorque

On paper, it all looked tidy and consistent, almost like the language was trying to protect itself from outside influence. But real life didn’t always cooperate. Globalization and technology eventually made K, W, and Y impossible for Portuguese to avoid, and now I see the letters written in English words everywhere:

K: kiwi, karaoke, ketchup
W: WiFi, website, weekend (even though Portuguese say fim de semana)
Y: YouTube, yoga

When I walk into a restaurant, I see “whisky” (Portuguese remove the “e”) on the shelf, not uísque. Supermarket labels show ketchup, not catchupe. And when people talk about weight, they usually say quilo (kilo) or write “kg” for kilogram, not quilograma. Although many adapted spellings have fallen out of use, some have survived, especially the ones that avoid using the letter “y.” Yogurt is almost always spelled iogurte in the markets, and syrup is still written as “xarope”, another example of Portuguese reshaping foreign spellings to fit its own system.

And then there’s “WC”, which I see in restaurants, offices and cafés. Everyone knows it means bathroom, and in Portugal no one cares that it’s an old English abbreviation. It’s another example of how foreign letters slipped into everyday Portuguese whether the alphabet wanted them or not.

This instinct to refit and simplify words isn’t new. Portuguese used to have spellings like “ph” and “th,” leftover from the old Greek and Latin. Over time, those spellings were simplified: pharmacia became farmácia (pharmacy), theatro became teatro (theater). The language kept the sound and meaning but dropped the extra letters, the same instinct that kept K, W, and Y out of the alphabet for so long.

But for a long time, none of this was technically “allowed.” The three letters still weren’t officially part of the alphabet. That didn’t change until 1990, when Portuguese-speaking countries agreed to finally add K, W, and Y and bump the alphabet up to 26 letters. They’d been in use for decades; now they were just getting formal recognition.

Living here, I mostly see them in brand names, measurements, and imported words. They’re around, but they still aren’t part of everyday native Portuguese vocabulary. I’ll never find a bunch of traditional Portuguese words starting with K the way I would in English.

And that fits a much older pattern. Portugal has been shaped by Romans, Moors, explorers, dictatorships, revolutions, the EU, and mass waves of tourism, and I can see traces of all that in the language. Portugal has always adapted to outside influences but reshaped them into something that feels Portuguese. Americans tend to adopt foreign words as they are, such as samba, piranha, and siesta, but Portuguese historically has done the opposite, refitting them to match the language in a way that feels distinctly Portuguese. Even something as small as the alphabet shows that history: adapting, but never completely giving in. Even letters weren’t safe.

So yes, Portuguese technically has 26 letters now.

And as I’ve been learning Portuguese, I’ve realized that even the history of its alphabet tells a story: always absorbing, but never losing what makes it Portuguese.

Two Other Little Things Portuguese Taught Me

Portugal loves abbreviations. I see them everywhere on signs, menus, receipts, government buildings: MB for Multibanco (ATMs), SNS for the national health system, CTT for the postal service. In America, it’s Post Office, never “PO”. The Portuguese use abbreviations like full words, and everyone just gets it. They’re quick and almost never translated. If something can be shortened, it usually is. It’s very “why use four syllables when two letters will do?”

Some of these abbreviations are so common that they feel like their own vocabulary. Government agencies, public services, and even grocery store receipts are packed with initials. It’s a kind of “say only what you need and trust everyone else knows the rest.”

Accent marks, on the other hand, do the opposite. They add the detail, precision, and rules. Lots of rules. For English speakers like me, they were one of my first hurdles. They’re not decorative; they change the stress, pronunciation, and sometimes the meaning of the word entirely. “Avó” is grandmother. “Avô” is grandfather. Notice the two different accent marks over each “o”? Even though both words are spelled the same, the accent marks change the pronunciation and therefore the meaning. Miss an accent and people will understand you, but they’ll hear the mistake immediately.

Together, abbreviations and accent marks say something about how Portuguese works. The language trims what it doesn’t need and sharpens what it does. It cuts words down to their initials but insists on marking the exact syllable you should stress. It’s simple and picky at the same time, a balance that feels uniquely Portuguese.

All these little things, from the missing letters to the abbreviations and accent marks, ended up teaching me more than vocabulary. They taught me a bit of the history behind the language, how to understand abbreviations without needing the full words, and where to put the stress just by looking at an accent mark. Now that I’ve learned these details, they’ve changed how I speak, how I read menus and signs, how I hear conversations, and how I understand the language as a whole.

Everything Else In Between
Small Observations, Curiosities, and Discoveries of Life in Portugal
Carnaval After a Stormy Year. Carnaval season wrapped up here in town, though this year definitely felt different. After a series of strong winter storms rolled through our area, most events were canceled. The last parade happened on Fat Tuesday, February 17. Steve joined a group of expats who walked in it, apparently the first time expats have ever formed their own group. I watched from the sidelines with a friend. The weather held up, just a bit windy. Even with the scaled-back schedule, it was good to see people of all ages out there. Carnaval means a lot to the Portuguese, and I can tell how much work goes into it, the costumes, the music, the floats. It’s a community effort that builds all year. I’m hoping next year the full celebrations return without interruptions.
The Storms Didn’t Just Affect Carnaval. They also caused serious damage to the roof of our town’s Municipal Farmers Market. After inspecting the building, the municipality closed it right away out of concern for safety. About 55 merchants are being moved to our town’s Culture Center so they can keep their stands open while repairs are underway. The market is expected to stay closed until the first week of April. Since the building is already shut down, the municipality is using the time to update the interior such as flooring, electrical work, and refurbishing the bathrooms. I’m looking forward to seeing the changes in the spring, especially since the market is such a central part of daily life here.
Here are some photos from our town’s temporary Municipal Farmers Market.

Say It Like a Local:
My online Portuguese language course hasn’t required me learn the alphabet. When I first started learning Portuguese, I remember studying the alphabet and trying to say each letter. Here’s the alphabet, with pronunciations in parenthesis. Notice all of the accent marks. They tell me to “say this vowel louder,” “make this sound open or closed,” “nasalize this one,” or “which ‘c’ should sound like an ‘s.’” So if there’s a Portuguese word I haven’t seen before, these accent marks help me know which syllable to stress or what vowel sound to make.
A → á → (ah)
B → bê → (beh)
C → cê → (seh)
D → dê → (deh)
E → é → (eh)
F → éfe → (EH-fuh)
G → gê → (zheh)
H → agá → (ah-GAH)
I → i → (ee)
J → jota → (ZHO-tuh)
K → cá → (kah)
L → éle → (EL-uh)
M → éme → (EM-uh)
N → éne → (EN-uh)
O → ó → (aw)
P → pê → (peh)
Q → quê → (keh)
R → érre → (EH-rruh)
S → ésse → (ES-uh)
T → tê → (teh)
U → u → (oo)
V → vê → (veh)
W → dâblio → (DAB-lee-oo)
X → xis → (sheesh)
Y → ípsilon → (EEP-see-lon)
Z → zê → (zeh)

Até á próxima, tchau! | Until next time, bye!

Two Sardines on Cobblestone

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