Brazil is the only Portuguese-speaking country in South America.
Portuguese became dominant in Brazil because Portugal claimed and colonized the territory after the 1494 Treaty of Tordesillas divided newly encountered lands between Portugal and Spain. Brazil’s Portuguese-speaking area expanded far beyond the initial coastal settlements through exploration, settlement, missionary activity, and the growth of colonial frontiers.
Brazil’s language distinguishes it from all of its South American neighbors, most of which use Spanish as an official or dominant language. Portuguese in Brazil developed distinctive pronunciation, vocabulary, and regional varieties, influenced by Indigenous languages and African languages brought by enslaved people. Brazilian Portuguese is therefore related to European Portuguese but is not identical to it.
The country is also the largest Portuguese-speaking nation in the world by population. Portuguese is Brazil’s official language, while many Indigenous languages continue to be spoken. English-language learners sometimes assume Spanish is official because Brazil is surrounded by Spanish-speaking countries, but Brazil’s colonial history produced a different linguistic identity.