Acordar (To Wake Up) — Full Conjugation

Acordar primarily means to wake up — the intransitive event of waking from sleep, or the transitive act of waking someone else. It is one of the first verbs a learner needs: you use it every morning when you talk about your routine. A secondary, more formal meaning is to agree on or to reach an agreement — this usage is perfectly current in legal, journalistic, and literary registers, though colloquial speech usually prefers combinar or chegar a acordo.

Acordar is a fully regular first-conjugation (-ar) verb. In European Portuguese, it is not inherently pronominal — you typically say simply acordei cedo (I woke up early), not acordei-me cedo. Brazilian Portuguese and some older EP texts will use the reflexive acordar-se, but in today's spoken and written EP that construction sounds either dated or regional. When the verb is transitive — "to wake someone up" — acordar takes a direct object: acorda-me às sete (wake me at seven).

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Present indicative — presente do indicativo

Acordo às seis = I wake up at six.

Imperfect indicative — pretérito imperfeito

Past habits and background descriptions. Quando era pequeno, acordava sempre ao amanhecer = When I was little, I always woke at dawn.

Preterite indicative — pretérito perfeito simples

Completed past actions. Acordei cedo hoje = I woke up early today.

As with all -ar verbs in EP, the nós preterite takes the acute: acordámos (we woke up), distinct from the present acordamos (we wake up).

Pluperfect indicative, simple — pretérito mais-que-perfeito simples

Literary/formal form.

Pluperfect indicative, compound — pretérito mais-que-perfeito composto

The everyday way to say had woken up. Formed with ter (imperfect) + acordado.

Present perfect — pretérito perfeito composto

Action repeated or ongoing up to now. Tenho acordado cedo esta semana = I have been waking up early this week.

Simple future — futuro do indicativo simples

Future perfect — futuro perfeito

Conditional — condicional

Conditional perfect — condicional composto

Present subjunctive — presente do conjuntivo

Queria que acordasses mais cedo becomes Quero que acordes mais cedo with present-tense main verb.

Imperfect subjunctive — imperfeito do conjuntivo

Future subjunctive — futuro do conjuntivo

Quando acordares, faz o pequeno-almoço = When you wake up, make breakfast.

Present perfect subjunctive — pretérito perfeito do conjuntivo

Pluperfect subjunctive — pretérito mais-que-perfeito do conjuntivo

Future perfect subjunctive — futuro perfeito do conjuntivo

Imperative — imperativo

Affirmative:

Negative (uses present subjunctive):

Personal infinitive — infinitivo pessoal

Compound personal infinitive — infinitivo pessoal composto

Transitive vs. intransitive: a key distinction

Acordar can be used two ways that have different grammatical structures:

1. Intransitive — the subject wakes up on their own. No object, no reflexive pronoun needed in EP. Acordei às sete. = I woke up at seven.

2. Transitive — the subject wakes someone else up. Takes a direct object (or an object pronoun). O barulho acordou o bebé. = The noise woke the baby up. Acorda-me às sete, se faz favor. = Wake me at seven, please.

What about "acordar-se"?

The reflexive acordar-se (literally "to wake oneself up") is grammatical but heavily marked in modern EP. You will see it in older literature and hear it occasionally in emphatic or slightly formal contexts — but it is not the default. In daily EP speech, just acordar without a pronoun is the norm.

Compare with Brazilian Portuguese

Brazilian Portuguese uses acordar without the pronoun much as EP does, but when teachers or some grammar books emphasize reflexive routines ("me acordei cedo") you are likely reading a BP source. Do not transfer that pattern into EP speech.

The secondary meaning: to agree on

A formal usage of acordar means to agree on / to reach an agreement. This is most common in legal and journalistic writing.

In everyday conversation, native speakers usually reach for combinar ("combinámos encontrar-nos às oito") or chegar a acordo ("chegámos a acordo"). If you use acordar in this sense in a café chat, it will sound slightly bookish but not wrong.

Common collocations

• acordar cedo / tarde — to wake up early / late
• acordar com o despertador — to wake up to the alarm clock
• acordar em sobressalto — to wake up with a start
• acordar de manhã — to wake up in the morning
• acordar de um sonho / pesadelo — to wake up from a dream / nightmare
• acordar para a vida — to wake up to life (idiom: to see things as they really are)
• acordar + objeto direto — to wake (someone) up
• acordar um termo / um acordo — (formal) to agree on a term / an agreement

Example sentences in context

Common mistakes

Key takeaways

• Acordar is a fully regular -ar verb. Endings follow any standard -ar pattern.
• In EP, the intransitive "to wake up" does not normally take a reflexive pronoun: Acordei not Acordei-me.
• When transitive ("to wake someone up"), acordar takes a direct object, not an indirect one: Acordei-o, Acordei-a.
• The secondary meaning to agree on is formal/legal; in daily speech, prefer combinar or chegar a acordo.
• Watch the EP preterite accent: acordámos ≠ acordamos.
• The negative tu imperative uses the subjunctive: não acordes, not não acorda.