Impersonal Sentences

A lot of Portuguese sentences do not have a subject at all. Chove — it rains. Há trânsito — there's traffic. Dizem que vai chover — they say it's going to rain. É difícil encontrar estacionamento — it's hard to find parking. Each of these describes something happening without naming who it is happening to, who is making it happen, or who would even count as a subject. English fills the gap with a placeholder it or they or there; Portuguese, more economically, simply leaves the subject slot empty. This family of constructions — impersonal sentences — is larger than learners usually realize and is central to how Portuguese actually sounds. European Portuguese, in particular, has a strong preference for one of these strategies — the reflexive se — that needs real attention, because getting it wrong is an immediate marker of a non-native speaker.

What "impersonal" means

A sentence is impersonal when it has no grammatical subject, or when its subject is so generic that no particular person or thing is meant. Portuguese has several distinct impersonal constructions, each with its own shape and its own range of uses. The main ones are:

1. Weather and natural phenomena — chover, nevar, trovejar, relampejar, fazer frio/calor, estar sol.
2. Existentials — haver, and to a lesser extent existir.
3. Reflexive se with impersonal or passive meaning — vende-se, fala-se, vendem-se casas.
4. Third-person plural with unspecified subject — dizem que..., dizem, roubaram o carro.
5. Copula + adjective + infinitive — é difícil estudar, é possível fazer, é necessário agir.
6. One-word impersonal verbs — basta (it's enough), convém (it's advisable), importa (it matters), urge (it's urgent).

Each is a distinct grammatical pattern with its own rules. Let's walk through them.

1. Weather and natural phenomena

Portuguese verbs for weather and natural events are impersonal by default. They always appear in the third-person singular, and they never take a subject.

Alongside the specialized weather verbs, Portuguese uses fazer, estar, and haver with weather conditions as their "subject." These are also impersonal in the sense that they have no person or thing doing anything — the expressions refer to the ambient state of the world.

Which verb goes with which condition is a matter of idiom:

2. Existentials: há and existir

The existential há (there is / there are) is impersonal — it has no subject. The noun that appears with it is a direct object, not a subject, which is why há does not pluralize: há muitas pessoas, never hão muitas pessoas.

Full treatment of existentials is on Expressing 'There Is/There Are'. The key point for impersonal grammar: haver is a genuine no-subject construction, while existir (which does agree in number) is technically personal but often used impersonally in the same slots.

3. The reflexive se — passive and impersonal

This is the one that needs the most care. Portuguese uses the clitic se to form two overlapping constructions that English speakers often conflate: the se-passive and the impersonal se. The distinction matters because agreement works differently in each, and European Portuguese is strict about it.

Se-passive (passiva pronominal)

The se-passive is used when the verb has an underlying logical object that is promoted to look like a subject. The verb agrees in number with that promoted element.

Notice the agreement: vende-se uma casa (singular) vs vendem-se casas (plural). European Portuguese grammarians are strict about this — vende-se casas is considered a non-standard lapse, though you will hear it in casual speech.

Impersonal se

The impersonal se is used when there is no underlying object — the sentence is truly subjectless, and se simply signals that an unspecified someone does the action. The verb stays in the third-person singular.

The verb is always singular here because there is no subject for it to agree with. Vivem-se bem em Portugal would be a grammatical error.

The tricky edge: transitive verbs with a clear logical object

When a transitive verb has a patient that could in principle be the subject, EP grammars require the se-passive (with agreement). Learners who carry Brazilian-influenced grammar over sometimes default to the singular.

For formal writing — job adverts, legal notices, academic prose — always make the verb agree.

Why this construction is so PT-PT

European Portuguese reaches for the se-passive almost automatically where English uses a plain passive (is sold, is spoken, are rented). The periphrastic passive with ser + past participle (é vendida uma casa, é falado português) exists but sounds stiff and less natural in many contexts; the se-passive does the equivalent work with fewer words.

If you have ever walked around Lisbon and noticed shop windows with signs like VENDE-SE, ALUGA-SE, PRECISA-SE, you have seen the se-construction in the wild. It is the default way to advertise without naming an agent.

4. Third-person plural with unspecified subject

When you want to say they in a generic sense — they say, they robbed the place, they built this in 1850 — Portuguese uses a bare third-person-plural verb with no subject pronoun. This is a fully impersonal construction because the "they" is not anyone in particular.

Unlike English "they," the Portuguese version does not require a plural antecedent or even a plausible group. Dizem que... can be used even when the speaker is citing a single source — "they say" here is really "it's said." Similarly, Roubaram-me a carteira reports the theft without asserting that multiple thieves were involved.

This construction overlaps with the impersonal se in some contexts, and a speaker can often choose between them.

The se version feels slightly more formal and written; the bare plural feels conversational. Both are completely normal in European Portuguese.

5. Copula + adjective + infinitive

A very productive impersonal pattern uses ser + an adjective of evaluation + an infinitive. There is no real subject — the infinitive clause holds that grammatical role, but semantically the sentence is evaluating an activity generically.

A variant pattern uses é + adjective + de + infinitive when you want to evaluate a thing rather than an abstract activity:

Here este exercício and esta receita are the grammatical subjects, but the sentence is still evaluative in the impersonal-feeling way English captures with "hard to X." The preposition de links the adjective to the infinitive.

Note the difference:

6. One-word impersonal verbs

A handful of verbs are classically impersonal in Portuguese, always appearing in the third-person singular with no subject. They introduce a complement clause (with or without que) or an infinitive.

These verbs carry a slightly formal register; in casual speech, many speakers would paraphrase with é melhor, é importante, é preciso instead.

Impersonal ter — and why it's not a thing in PT-PT

Brazilian Portuguese uses ter as an impersonal existential: tem muita gente aqui (there are a lot of people here). This is not standard in European Portuguese. In PT-PT, use há. See Expressing 'There Is/There Are' for details.

Se + você and generic "you"

A colloquial alternative to the impersonal se is generic você — using the pronoun to mean one or people in general. This is far more common in Brazil than in Portugal, where the se construction dominates. In PT-PT you may occasionally hear it, especially from younger speakers, but it still sounds less native-sounding than the se construction.

Impersonal infinitive with prepositions

Portuguese also forms a rich impersonal pattern with prepositions + infinitive, especially a + infinitive, de + infinitive, and por + infinitive.

These are genuinely impersonal because there is no explicit subject attached to the infinitive — the construction evaluates or describes without assigning agency.

Choosing among the impersonal strategies

For a given generic idea, Portuguese often offers several impersonal options. The choice depends on register, emphasis, and what exactly you are reporting.

European Portuguese prose typically favours the left column (se-passive and impersonal se). Spoken Portuguese freely uses the middle column (third-person plural). The right column (periphrastic passive) exists but is reserved for contexts where the subject is definite and specific, not generic.

Register notes

• (informal) Third-person-plural impersonals (dizem que..., roubaram) are ubiquitous. Weather verbs and há are constant. Se-passive is used but learners drop the agreement.
• (neutral/written) Se-passive is the preferred way to render agentless passives. Agreement is expected.
• (formal) Convir, urgir, importar, copula + adjective + infinitive are the marks of formal Portuguese.
• (literary) Impersonal constructions combine with fronting and subject inversion for rhythm. Parece, cabe, urge appear more often than in speech.

Common Mistakes

Key Takeaways

• Portuguese impersonal sentences have no subject, or only a generic, unspecified one. Six main patterns: weather verbs, existentials, se-constructions, third-person plural, copula + adjective + infinitive, and one-word impersonal verbs.
• European Portuguese strongly prefers the reflexive se-passive over the periphrastic passive: vendem-se casas, fala-se português.
• Se-passive agrees with the promoted subject (vendem-se casas); impersonal se stays singular (vive-se bem). The distinction is strict in PT-PT.
• Third-person-plural with no pronoun (dizem que..., roubaram-me) is the standard way to report events with an unspecified agent.
• Weather verbs (chover, nevar) and ambient-state expressions (faz frio, há sol, está calor) are all impersonal.
• PT-PT uses há, never tem, for existence; and estar a + infinitive, never estar + gerund, for progressive aspect.
• Copula + adjective + infinitive (é difícil estudar) is the go-to pattern for generic evaluations.