Futuro do Pretérito (Conditional): Overview

The futuro do pretérito — literally "the future of the past" — is what English calls the conditional: the would form. It's the verb you use to describe what would happen under some condition (Eu compraria uma casa — "I would buy a house"), to make requests gentler (Você poderia me ajudar? — "Could you help me?"), and to talk about a future seen from a point in the past (Ela disse que viria — "She said she would come"). Its Portuguese name is a clue to its nature: it sits at a distance, looking forward from somewhere that isn't the real present.

The four core uses

1. Hypotheticals — what would happen if…

This is the textbook use. The conditional names the result of an imagined, unreal, or unlikely condition. It typically pairs with a se ("if") clause in the imperfect subjunctive.

The action isn't real — it's contingent on a condition that may not hold. For the conditional + se machinery, see hypothetical/counterfactual sentences.

2. Polite requests — softening an ask

Swapping the present for the conditional turns a blunt demand into a courteous request. This is the single most frequent use of the conditional in everyday Brazilian speech, concentrated in a handful of verbs: poderia (could), gostaria (would like), seria (would be).

Compare Você pode me ajudar? ("Can you help me?") with Você poderia me ajudar? ("Could you help me?"). The conditional adds politeness by stepping back from the directness of the present — exactly like English "could" versus "can." See polite uses.

3. Future-in-the-past — what was going to happen

When you report, from a past vantage point, an action that was still ahead at that time, you use the conditional. English does this with "would": She said she would come. This is the use that most directly justifies the name future of the past.

See future-in-the-past for more.

4. Softening opinions and conjecture

The conditional hedges a statement, presenting it as tentative rather than asserted. This is the eu diria que… ("I'd say that…") move, and it also covers polite conjecture about facts.

How it's formed

The conditional is built on the whole infinitive plus a single set of endings. You don't drop the -ar/-er/-ir — you keep the entire infinitive and add the ending. The endings are the same for all three verb classes.

Note the accent placement carefully: the nós form carries an acute accent on the first i — compraríamos, viajaríamos, poderíamos — because the stress falls there. The singular forms (compraria, gostaria, viajaria) have no accent.

Only three verbs are irregular, and they're the same three that are irregular in the simple future: dizer → diria, fazer → faria, trazer → traria (they drop the -e- of the infinitive). Everything else is perfectly regular. Full details in conditional formation.

The big colloquial fact: the imperfect substitutes for the conditional

This is the point most learners aren't told, and it's essential for understanding real spoken Brazilian. In casual speech, the imperfect indicative very often replaces the conditional in hypotheticals. Where careful writing uses compraria, everyday conversation uses comprava.

Both comprava and compraria are heard, but comprava is the relaxed, spoken default; compraria sounds slightly more careful or formal. This is parallel to how English speakers sometimes say "if I had the money, I was gonna buy a house" in very casual registers — except in Brazil the imperfect-for-conditional swap is fully mainstream, not substandard. See the counterfactual imperfect for the full treatment.

How English compares

English has no dedicated conditional form — it builds the conditional analytically with the modal "would" (plus "could," "should"). Portuguese folds all of that into a single inflected ending. So the mapping is:

• would buy → compraria
• would like → gostaria
• could help → poderia ajudar
• would come → viria

The trickiest adjustment for English speakers is the future-in-the-past: English uses the same "would" for both "I would buy if…" (hypothetical) and "she said she would come" (reported future). Portuguese uses the conditional for both too, so that part transfers cleanly. The genuinely new habit to build is the imperfect-for-conditional swap in speech, which has no English equivalent.

Common Mistakes

Key Takeaways

• The futuro do pretérito is the English conditional (would): hypotheticals, polite requests, future-in-the-past, softened opinions.
• Form it on the full infinitive
  • -ia, -ias, -ia, -íamos, -iam; only dizer/fazer/trazer are irregular.
• Watch the accent: the nós form takes an acute on the first í — comprariamos (no accent) is wrong; it's compraríamos.
• In speech, the imperfect routinely replaces the conditional for hypotheticals (comprava for compraria).
• The conditional stays firmly in place for politeness (gostaria, poderia) even in casual speech.