Should I Learn Portuguese or Spanish First?

In the world of languages, Spanish and Portuguese are like cousins. They both come from the same family essentially but have their noticeable differences. It's often said that when you learn languages at the same time or one after another. Aim for languages that are different spectrums, such as French or Japanese. But there's nothing wrong with bending the rules to fit your needs.

If you are looking to learn commonly spoken languages, Portuguese and Spanish will put you on the right track. Learning a new language is already overwhelming enough, especially if you are embarking on the journey of self-studying. Now you have to choose which language to learn first! Yikes!

Part of you choosing which language to learn first should be about your personal preference. Having fun is an important part of the process. However, if you want to be practical, you want to think about the mutual relationship between the two languages. Which should you learn first, Portuguese or Spanish?

The Cousin Languages

So, the good news is that Spanish and Portuguese have the same syntax, which is sentence structure. If you're a native English speaker, you won't have to learn a new word order. The other thing about Spanish and Portuguese is that they have over 80% lexical similarities. Therefore, whatever you learn in Spanish will likely be the same word in Portuguese.

It is worth mentioning that while Spanish and Portuguese do look the same in written form, speaking is a bit different. Spanish is a phonetic language, meaning what you see is what you get. However, Portuguese can be a little fussy pronunciation-wise. The "v" and "z" sounds are missing from Spanish. Meanwhile, in Portuguese, those sounds are included along with five other consonants.

Now, let's break down the pros and cons to organize your thoughts. And help you decide as to whether you should learn Portuguese or learn Spanish first.

Pros Of Learning Spanish First

As previously mentioned, Spanish is a phonetic language. What you see is what you get and nothing else beyond that. It's an easy language to pick up and will help you with other Romance languages. And with the lexical similarities between Spanish and Portuguese, it can be an excellent foundation for you when you start focusing on your writing skills.

Pros of Learning Portuguese First

For the advantages of learning Portuguese first, this section will focus less on the written part of the language and more on speaking. It may come as a surprise, but native Portuguese speakers have a much easier time understanding a Spanish speaker than vice versa. It is because Spanish pronunciation is a lot more straightforward than in Portuguese. Therefore, as you improve in Portuguese, learning Spanish will be almost a no-brainer.

Whether you learn Portuguese or Spanish depends on where you plan to live and how you intend to use it. Noth languages will work in favor of one another. The most important part of the language journey is to have fun. And go based on your interests.