Learn Hardcore Portuguese (Portugal): O Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano.

This is standard in Portugal in most everyday speech. It can sound odd or overly formal not to use the article, especially in casual conversation.

Notes:

In Brazilian Portuguese, using the article before first names is much less common and can even sound strange in some regions.
In writing or in more formal styles (titles, lists, official documents), even in Portugal, you may see names without the article: Pedro Silva, Maria Costa.

So in everyday European Portuguese, O Pedro quer… is the normal way to say it.

What’s the difference between quer and querer?

Querer is the infinitive form, “to want”.
Quer is the 3rd person singular present tense form, “he/she/it wants”.

Partial conjugation of querer (present tense):

eu quero – I want
tu queres – you want (singular, informal)
ele / ela / você quer – he / she / you (formal) wants
nós queremos – we want
vocês querem – you (plural) want
eles / elas querem – they want

So:

O Pedro quer… = “Pedro wants…”
O Pedro querer… would be ungrammatical here; you must conjugate the verb.

Why do we say quer deixar instead of just quer plus a noun, like in English “wants a cigarette”?

In Portuguese, when one verb is directly followed by another action, the second verb usually appears in the infinitive:

quer deixar – wants to stop/quit
quer fumar – wants to smoke
quer comer – wants to eat

So the pattern is:

[conjugated verb] + [infinitive]
quer (he wants) + deixar (to stop)

If you wanted to say “Pedro wants a cigarette”, you would use quer plus a noun:

O Pedro quer um cigarro.

What exactly does deixar de mean? Is it just “stop”?

Deixar de + infinitive means to stop doing something / to quit doing something.

In this sentence:

deixar de fumar = to stop smoking / to quit smoking

Nuance:

deixar de often implies giving something up, especially a habit or something done regularly:
- deixar de fumar – quit smoking (habit)
- deixar de beber – quit drinking (alcohol, usually)
- deixar de comer carne – stop eating meat

It can also mean just “to no longer do something”:

Deixei de ir ao ginásio. – I stopped going to the gym.

So deixar de ≈ “to stop / to give up / to no longer do”.

Why is there a de before fumar in deixar de fumar?

Some verbs in Portuguese are normally followed by a preposition before the infinitive.
Deixar, in the sense of “stop / give up”, is one of them: it takes de.

Common patterns:

deixar de fumar – stop smoking
deixar de estudar – stop studying
deixar de trabalhar – stop working

You can think of deixar de almost as one unit: “deixar-de + verb” = to stop + verb.

You cannot normally say:

✗ deixar fumar (to stop smoking) – this would be understood as “to allow smoking” because deixar also means “to let / to allow” when used without de.

Could we say O Pedro quer parar de fumar este ano instead? Is there a difference?

Yes, you can say:

O Pedro quer parar de fumar este ano.

This is also correct in European Portuguese.

Differences:

deixar de fumar – very idiomatic; often used for quitting a habit (like smoking).
parar de fumar – also understandable and used; parar = “to stop” (more general).

In Portugal:

deixar de fumar is probably the most common way to talk about quitting smoking.
parar de fumar is okay, but sounds a bit less standard than deixar de fumar in this context.

In Brazil:

parar de fumar is very frequent.
deixar de fumar is also correct but may sound slightly more formal or “standard” in some regions.

For your purposes in European Portuguese, deixar de fumar is the safest, most natural choice.

Why is the verb quer in the present tense if we’re talking about “this year” (the future)?

Portuguese often uses the present tense to talk about the near future or a future plan/intention, especially when there’s a time expression:

O Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano.
= Pedro wants to quit smoking this year / Pedro intends to quit this year.

Other examples:

Amanhã vou ao médico. – Tomorrow I’m going to the doctor.
No próximo ano mudamos de casa. – Next year we’re moving house.

You could also use a more explicitly future form:

O Pedro vai deixar de fumar este ano. – Pedro is going to quit smoking this year.

But quer deixar focuses more on his desire/intention than on the scheduled future event.

Can I move este ano to the front of the sentence?

Yes. Both of these are correct:

O Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano.
Este ano, o Pedro quer deixar de fumar.

Differences:

O Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano. – neutral word order; time phrase at the end.
Este ano, o Pedro quer deixar de fumar. – slightly emphasizes “this year, as opposed to other years”.

In speech, the second version might carry a slight contrastive meaning, like:

He’s tried before, but this year, he wants to quit.

What exactly does este ano mean? How is it different from esse ano or aquele ano?

Demonstratives in European Portuguese roughly work like this (for “year”):

este ano – this year (the current year, or very close to the speaker)
esse ano – that year (closer to the listener, or already mentioned)
aquele ano – that year (over there) / “that year (long ago / far away in context)”

In practice:

To say “this year” in the calendar sense (2025, etc.), European Portuguese normally uses este ano.
Esse ano is much more typical in Brazilian Portuguese meaning “this year”. In Portugal, using esse for time like that sounds more like “that year we were talking about”.

So for neutral “this year” in Portugal, use este ano, as in the sentence.

How would I say “Pedro doesn’t want to quit smoking this year”?

You just add não (not) in front of the conjugated verb quer:

O Pedro não quer deixar de fumar este ano.

Structure:

[subject] + [não] + [conjugated verb] + [infinitive] + [time expression]
O Pedro + não + quer + deixar de fumar + este ano.

Não always comes before the conjugated verb, not before the infinitive:

✔ não quer deixar de fumar
✗ quer não deixar de fumar (this would mean “wants not to stop smoking”, which is different and odd).

How would I turn this into a yes–no question: “Does Pedro want to quit smoking this year?”

In Portuguese you usually keep the same word order and add a question mark (and change intonation in speech):

O Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano?
– Does Pedro want to quit smoking this year?

You don’t normally invert subject and verb like in English (“Wants Pedro…”). The subject–verb order stays:

O Pedro quer … ?

Is the article O always required here, or could I say just Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano?

In everyday European Portuguese:

O Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano. – most natural, standard.
Pedro quer deixar de fumar este ano. – possible, but can sound:
- more formal / written, or
- more like a headline / list / caption, or
- influenced by Brazilian usage.

In spoken Portuguese in Portugal, people almost always say O Pedro, A Ana, O João, etc.

So for normal conversational European Portuguese, keep the article:

O Pedro quer…