Portuguese Months: How to Say and Write All 12

The Portuguese months look deceptively similar to English — janeiro, abril, dezembro — but pronunciation moves them into another family entirely: the r becomes an h in Brazil, the nasals sound like the French a in danse, and no month is ever capitalized. This guide gives you all twelve months with pronunciation, the date and preposition rules, and the sentences that actually use them.

The Twelve Months with Pronunciation

Each month with its Portuguese spelling and the sounds that matter:

• Janeiro (zhah-NAY-roo) — January; nasal ja at the start, the -eiro ending stressed.
• Fevereiro (feh-veh-RAY-roo) — February; in Brazil the final r becomes an h-like breath: fay-veh-RAY-hoo.
• Março (MAHR-soo) — March; the ç is an s sound.
• Abril (ah-BREEL) — April.
• Maio (MAHY-oo) — May; two syllables, má-io.
• Junho (JOO-nyoo) — June; the nh is the ny of canyon.
• Julho (JOO-lyoo) — July; the lh is the million ly.
• Agosto (ah-GOSH-too) — August; the s between vowels is a z, the g before o is hard.
• Setembro (seh-TEM-broo) — September.
• Outubro (oh-TOO-broo) — October.
• Novembro (noh-VEM-broo) — November.
• Dezembro (deh-ZEM-broo) — December.

The -embro trio pairs with English by one letter shift: tem, tub, vem. The nasal m at the end of those months only sounds through the following word: setembro é … says seh-TEM-broo-ee.

Pronunciation Traps: The r, the Nasals, and the Endings

Three sounds repeat across the twelve months and collapse most learner accents:

1. The Brazilian r. In fevereiro and março, an r before a consonant sounds like a breathed h: fevereiro ≈ feh-veh-RAY-hoo. In Portugal the same r is a rolled tap. Both are correct in their territory.
2. The nasal vowels. Janeiro, and every -embro, nasalize the last vowel before the m: setembro ends in a nasal em, not an English em. It is the same sound family as the French an in enfant.
3. The -eiro ending. Stressed and open: janeiro, fevereiro. Finger the shape and you unlock half the dates in Portuguese.

Listen to one native sentence per month (news podcasts cover them all within a week) and shadow it; the months are short enough to perfect fast.

Lowercase Rule: Days, Months, and Seasons

Portuguese writes time words in lowercase:

• outubro — October (not October).
• terça-feira — Tuesday.
• primavera, verão, outono, inverno — spring, summer, autumn, winter.
• Holidays and proper names keep capitals: Ano-Novo (New Year), Natal (Christmas), Dia das Mães (Mother’s Day).

A sentence like Outubro é o meu mês favorito (October is my favorite month) looks lowercase-correct and instantly marks your writing as Brazilian- or Portuguese-schooled.

Dates: The Order That Never Changes

Portuguese dates go day, month, year — the reverse of US English:

• 05/06/2026 — cinco de junho de dois mil e vinte e seis (in the Brazilian reading: June 5, but written day-first).
• The first of any month is primeiro: primeiro de janeiro — never um de janeiro... which sounds like a count, not a date.
• Short form in speech: cinco do seis — the informal Brazilian way to say 05/06.
• Years: dois mil e vinte e seis; the connectives e appear between every numeral group after the thousand.

Keep a date diary: write one date a day in Portuguese and read it aloud; two weeks of that fixes the order and the primeiro rule permanently.

Prepositions and Sentences with Months

• Em + month: em janeiro (in January). Nós viajamos em julho. (We travel in July.)
• De … a … for ranges: de janeiro a março.
• Até + month: as férias vão até agosto. (The vacation runs until August.)
• Em + season: em outono (in autumn); in Brazil, the seasons also appear with no preposition in fixed phrases: no verão (in the summer).
• Dia + de + month: no dia quinze de maio.
• Quanto tempo até …: até dezembro. (until December.)

The month is the anchor of every date sentence; once the preposition patterns feel mechanical, telling someone when anything happens takes zero effort.

The Verdict

Twelve months, three pronunciation rules (the Brazilian r, the nasals, the -eiro ending), one lowercase rule, and day-month-year order: that is the whole system. Learn the months in a sentence each — em janeiro viajo, meu aniversário é em maio — and dates stop being a chart and start being conversation.

Metheus trains your month vocabulary in context: hover over every month and date in Portuguese subtitles, hear the nasals and the Brazilian h, and save the sentences you want to reuse in your own calendar talk.

Seasons and Months Together

The months pair naturally with the Portuguese seasons, and the words recycle the lowercase rule:

• Primavera: setembro, outubro, novembro (southern) / março, abril, maio (northern).
• Verão: dezembro, janeiro, fevereiro in the south; junho, julho, agosto up north.
• Outono: março a maio (south) / setembro a novembro (north).
• Inverno: junho a agosto (south) / dezembro a fevereiro (north).

When you quote a season, Brazilians often attach the month to anchor it: no verão, em janeiro (in the summer, in January). Hearing the season-and-month pair trains the calendar grid without any drills.

Common Expressions and Festive Dates

Real conversation clusters around fixed dates; learn these as chunks:

• Ano-Novo (New Year), celebrated at virada do ano on 31 December.
• Carnaval — usually fevereiro or março; Brazilians say no carnaval.
• Férias de julho (July vacation) — the famous school and work break.
• Mês de Natal — December, the month of Christmas; em dezembro, tudo fica fechado.
• Primavera de outubro — Brazilian spring that starts in late September.
• Dia dos Namorados — Brazilian Valentine’s Day, fixed on 12 June (not February).

Answering Quando é o seu aniversário? (When is your birthday?) is the perfect month drill: É em março, dia quinze.

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