Obrigado - how to express your gratitude in Portuguese

by João Rosa

I'm Portuguese, and in my culture it is very important to thank other people when they do something for you, even if they are just doing their job. I've seen how this sometimes baffles some foreigners - "Why are you thanking him, he's just doing his job!" - well, if you don't, you'll be considered rude and may expect a degradation of that person's service in the future.

There are many ways to say "thank you" in Portuguese, that vary in formality and degree of gratitude:

Notes on gender and number

The "o" ending is used by males when giving thanks, e.g. obrigado. Females use the "a" ending, e.g. obrigada. If you are saying thanks in the name of a group of males, a mixed sex group or a collective entity - like a corporation to a client: you use the "os" ending, e.g. obrigados. When you say thanks in the name a group of females, you use the "as" ending, e.g. obrigadas.

Notes on saying thank you in Brazil

by Marcelo Luiz

In Brazil we use:

Obrigados and obrigadas are not normally used in Brazil.

Articles

Writing systems | Language and languages | Language learning | Pronunciation | Learning vocabulary | Language acquisition | Motivation and reasons to learn languages | Arabic | Basque | Celtic languages | Chinese | English | Esperanto | French | German | Greek | Hebrew | Indonesian | Italian | Japanese | Korean | Latin | Portuguese | Russian | Sign Languages | Spanish | Swedish | Other languages | Minority and endangered languages | Constructed languages (conlangs) | Reviews of language courses and books | Language learning apps | Teaching languages | Languages and careers | Being and becoming bilingual | Language and culture | Language development and disorders | Translation and interpreting | Multilingual websites, databases and coding | History | Travel | Food | Other topics | Spoof articles | How to submit an article

[top]


Green Web Hosting - Kualo

You can support this site by Buying Me A Coffee, and if you like what you see on this page, you can use the buttons below to share it with people you know.

 

SpanishPod101 - learn Spanish for free

If you like this site and find it useful, you can support it by making a donation via PayPal or Patreon, or by contributing in other ways. Omniglot is how I make my living.

 

Note: all links on this site to Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.fr are affiliate links. This means I earn a commission if you click on any of them and buy something. So by clicking on these links you can help to support this site.

[top]

iVisa.com