assistir — to watch

How to use assistir in Brazilian Portuguese

Assistir is the Brazilian Portuguese verb for to watch. It is a regular -ir verb, so once you know the endings there are no surprises.

Three tenses do almost all the work in conversation. The presente covers the present and the near future: eu assisto — I watch. The pretérito perfeito is the finished past, the English simple past: eu assisti — I watched. The pretérito imperfeito is for habits, background and how things used to be: eu assistia — I used to watch / attend.

Said the Rio way, assisto sounds like ah-SEESH-too. The nós form assistimos ends in the carioca “sh”, ah-seesh-CHEE-moosh — the most recognisable sound of the Rio accent, where São Paulo says a plain s. Notice assiste is ah-SEESH-chee: in Brazil a final -de softens to “jee” and -te to “chee”, something European Portuguese never does.