eu/tu/você/ele/ela

Subject pronouns are the words we use to replace names or nouns when they are the 'doer' of the sentence.

The Singular Pronouns:

• Eu: 'I'. Always used for the first person.
• Tu: 'You' (informal). Common in Portugal and specific regions of Brazil (like Rio de Janeiro, the South, the North, and the Northeast). In Portugal, formal writing, and some Brazilian regions, it must be used with its proper 2nd-person conjugations (see tu verb forms). However, in informal Brazilian speech, it is often used with 3rd person verbs.
• Você: 'You'. In Brazil, while often taught to foreigners as the standard informal 'you' and dominant in places like São Paulo and Minas Gerais, 'tu' is equally standard in its respective regions. In informal spoken Brazilian Portuguese, 'você' is frequently shortened to 'cê' (e.g., 'Cê vai?'). In Portugal, the word itself is often avoided because it can be perceived as harsh, too direct, or socially awkward; speakers there often use the 3rd person verb alone, address the person by title, or use their first name with a definite article (e.g., 'O João quer café?'). It always uses 3rd person verb forms because it originally comes from the formal title 'Vossa Mercê' (Your Mercy).
• O senhor / A senhora: 'You' (formal). Used to show respect to elders or in professional settings. Like 'você', these use 3rd person singular verbs. See formal address for more.
• Ele / Ela: 'He' and 'She'.
• A gente: Literally 'the people', but used as an informal 'we'. In informal spoken Brazilian Portuguese, it is the dominant default, though 'nós' is still used. While it is also used in Portugal, 'nós' remains very common there. Even though it means 'we', it always uses the 3rd person singular verb form (the same as ele/ela). Prescriptively, because 'gente' is a feminine singular noun, adjectives must always be feminine singular (e.g., 'A gente está cansada'). However, in colloquial speech, adjectives often agree with the actual people in the group (e.g., a group of men might say 'A gente está cansado'). Learn more about a gente.

Note: For plural forms, see Subject Pronouns (Plural).

Key Concepts for Beginners:
1. Pro-Drop Language: Unlike English, you don't always have to say the pronoun. If you say 'Moro em Lisboa', the verb ending already shows you mean 'I'.
2. The Tu vs. Você Divide: Choosing between these depends on where you are. You can become confident with this in the tu vs você guide.
3. Referring to 'It': While you can use ele and ela as subject pronouns for inanimate objects in Brazilian Portuguese, it is actually much more common to drop the pronoun entirely (pro-drop) to avoid overusing them. In European Portuguese, speakers also tend to omit the pronoun for things. However, both variants use them after prepositions, like in 'gosto dele' (I like it).
4. The 'Dummy It': In English, we use 'it' for weather, time, or impersonal phrases (e.g., 'It is raining'). In Portuguese, you use no pronoun at all for these impersonal verbs. You just say 'Chove' (It rains) or 'É tarde' (It is late). Never say 'Ele chove'!
5. Capitalization: Unlike 'I' in English, the pronoun eu (and all other subject pronouns) is never capitalized unless it appears at the very beginning of a sentence.