Russian → Portuguese
Portuguese uses 35 sounds. You already own 21 of them from Russian. The other 14 are the work — and 13 of those are the dangerous kind: close enough to something you already say that you will substitute them without hearing yourself do it.
The silent swaps
Your mouth has something close enough to reach for. These survive for years precisely because they sound right to you — the fix is hearing the difference first, not trying harder.
the move: alveolar → postalveolar
Portuguese: key · written "x", "ch", "s (final)"
Also every syllable-final s: os livros = /uʒ ˈlivɾuʃ/.
Your /s/ is the one in сон (sleep).
the move: alveolar → postalveolar
Portuguese: today · written "j", "g"
Your /z/ is the one in зуб (tooth).
the move: close, but not identical
Portuguese: wool · written "ã", "an", "am"
lá 'there' vs lã 'wool' — the nasality is the whole difference.
Your /ɐ/ is the one in вода́ (water).
the move: close, but not identical
Portuguese: time · written "em", "en"
Your /e/ is the one in ме́сто (place).
the move: close, but not identical
Portuguese: yes · written "im", "in"
Your /i/ is the one in и́мя (name).
the move: close, but not identical
Portuguese: good · written "õ", "om", "on"
Your /o/ is the one in дом (house).
the move: close, but not identical
Portuguese: one, a · written "um", "un"
Your /u/ is the one in рука́ (hand).
the move: close, but not identical
Portuguese: bad · written "u+vowel", "o (in ão)"
Your /j/ is the one in я (I).
the move: open → open-mid
Portuguese: foot · written "e", "é"
Open e. The accent tells you which: pêlo vs pélo.
Your /a/ is the one in мать (mother).
the move: close-mid → open-mid
Portuguese: grandmother · written "o", "ó"
avó /ɔ/ grandmother vs avô /o/ grandfather — one accent apart.
Your /o/ is the one in дом (house).
the move: approximant → nasal
Portuguese: wine · written "nh"
Spanish writes this ñ, French gn, Portuguese nh.
Your /j/ is the one in я (I).
the move: approximant → lateral
Portuguese: son · written "lh"
Your /j/ is the one in я (I).
Words you may say identically
Two or more Portuguese sounds landing on one sound of yours. Until the ear separates them, the mouth cannot — which is what the ear trainer is for.
Genuinely new
Nothing in Russian sits close to these. They sound foreign in your mouth — which is the good news: you can hear that you are not saying them yet.
car
Back in the throat, like French r. Brazil often makes it /h/.
Closest thing you own: — but retroflex → uvular.
Rhythm and pitch
The layer spelling never records, and the one that makes a correct sentence still sound foreign.
| Russian | Portuguese | |
|---|---|---|
| Rhythm | Stress-timed, heavily reduced | Stress-timed (Portugal) |
| Stress | Contrastive, and NOT written. За́мок is a castle and замо́к is a lock. Worse, it moves within a word’s own declension — рука́ but ру́ку, окно́ but о́кна — so knowing the word is not the same as knowing where to hit it. Dictionaries mark it; native writing does not. | Contrastive and written. The default is the second-to-last syllable; anything else takes an accent, and the accent also picks between open and close vowels — avó /ɔ/ is a grandmother and avô /o/ is a grandfather. |
What you have that Portuguese doesn't
25 sounds with no job in Portuguese. They are not mistakes — but they are where an accent leaks in, because a sound you own is easy to use when a hard one is due.
The honest caveat
This is a prediction from the shape of two sound systems, not a recording of you. It says what your inventory makes likely — it cannot know that your Russian has a regional variety that already owns one of these, or that you learned Portuguese from someone whose accent you copied. A teacher listening to you beats it. Use it to know what to listen for.
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