Ele é casado.

Because Portuguese normally uses ser for marital status:

• Ele é casado.
• Ela é solteira.
• Ele é divorciado.
• Ela é viúva.

So even though marriage is technically a state, Portuguese treats it as a more permanent characteristic in this kind of sentence.

As a beginner, it is best to learn:

• ser casado
• ser solteiro
• ser divorciado
• ser viúvo

and not try to use estar here by default.

É is the 3rd person singular form of the verb ser in the present tense.

So:

• eu sou = I am
• tu és = you are
• ele/ela é = he/she is
• nós somos = we are
• vocês são = you are
• eles/elas são = they are

In Ele é casado, é matches ele.

The accent is important.

• é = is
• e = and

So the accent helps distinguish two very common words.

It also tells you the vowel is pronounced as an open eh sound.

Here, casado functions as an adjective.

It comes historically from the past participle of casar / casar-se, but in this sentence it behaves like an adjective describing the person’s marital status.

That is why it changes for gender and number:

• casado = masculine singular
• casada = feminine singular
• casados = masculine plural / mixed plural
• casadas = feminine plural

Because ele is masculine, so the adjective must agree with it.

• Ele é casado.
• Ela é casada.

This kind of agreement is very common in Portuguese. Adjectives often change to match the gender and number of the noun or pronoun they describe.

Yes, sometimes.

Portuguese often drops the subject pronoun when the context is clear:

• É casado. = He is married / She is married / You are married depending on context

However, in the 3rd person singular, the verb form é does not tell you whether the subject is ele, ela, or even você. So if there is any chance of confusion, keep the pronoun.

As a full standalone sentence, Ele é casado is clearer than just É casado.

You change both the pronoun and the adjective ending:

• Ela é casada.

Only casado changes here, because it must agree with ela.

Use the plural of ser and the plural adjective:

• Eles são casados.
• Elas são casadas.

Remember:

• é becomes são
• casado/casada becomes casados/casadas

Use com:

• Ele é casado com a Ana.
• Ele é casado com a Maria.

In Portugal, it is very common to use an article before a person’s name in everyday speech, so com a Ana and com o João sound very natural.

In some contexts, especially more neutral written style, you may also see:

• com Ana
• com João

For the negative, put não before the verb:

• Ele não é casado.

For a yes/no question, Portuguese usually keeps the same word order and uses intonation in speech, or a question mark in writing:

• Ele é casado?

So the basic patterns are very simple:

• affirmative: Ele é casado.
• negative: Ele não é casado.
• question: Ele é casado?

A rough English-friendly guide would be:

• Ele ≈ EH-luh
• é ≈ eh
• casado ≈ kuh-ZAH-doo

But there are some important details in European Portuguese:

• unstressed vowels are often reduced, so Ele sounds shorter and less clear than an English speaker might expect
• the s in casado sounds like z because it is between vowels
• the final o is usually a reduced u-like sound in Portugal

So a more realistic rough impression is something like:

• EH-l(uh) eh kuh-ZAH-du

Not exact, but close enough for a beginner.

Not in this sentence.

After ser, Portuguese normally uses the adjective directly:

• Ele é casado.

Adding um would sound wrong here.

You might see casado used more like a noun in some special contexts, but that is not the normal pattern for saying someone is married. For everyday use, stick with:

• Ele é casado.

The related verb is casar or casar-se.

Useful forms are:

• casar = to marry
• casar-se = to get married
• casado = married

Examples:

• Eles vão casar-se. = They are going to get married.
• Ele é casado. = He is married.

So casado is part of the same word family as casar.