Breakdown of Nós vamos combinar um café depois do trabalho.
Questions & Answers about Nós vamos combinar um café depois do trabalho.
You can absolutely drop nós here.
Portuguese is a pro‑drop language, so the subject pronoun is often omitted when the verb form already shows who the subject is.
- Nós vamos combinar um café depois do trabalho.
- Vamos combinar um café depois do trabalho. ✅ (very natural)
Using nós puts a tiny bit more emphasis on we, but in everyday speech people would very often just say Vamos combinar….
In modern European Portuguese, ir + infinitive (here: vamos combinar) is much more common than the synthetic future (combinaremos) in everyday speech.
- Nós vamos combinar um café… = We’re going to arrange a coffee…
- Nós combinaremos um café… = grammatically correct, but sounds formal / written, or slightly old‑fashioned in casual conversation.
So:
- For spoken, natural Portuguese → prefer ir + infinitive (vamos combinar).
- The simple future (combinaremos) you’ll mostly see in more formal writing, legal texts, or to sound particularly serious / emphatic.
No. Here combinar does not mean to mix; it means to arrange / to set up / to agree on a plan.
- combinar um café ≈ to arrange to meet for a coffee
(to agree on having coffee together at some time/place)
So Nós vamos combinar um café… really means:
We’ll arrange to have coffee together after work.
You’re not talking about preparing the drink; you’re talking about fixing a social plan.
Literally, um café is a coffee (drink).
Culturally, in Portugal, vamos tomar / combinar um café often means:
Let’s meet briefly (and probably drink coffee).
So it’s both:
- On the surface: a coffee (usually an espresso in Portugal).
- In context: a short social meetup, usually informal, often at a café or bar.
If you really meant the social meetup more generally, you could also say:
- Vamos combinar um encontro depois do trabalho.
(We’re going to arrange a meet‑up after work.)
But um café is the very natural everyday way to say this.
Café in Portuguese is masculine, so it always takes um / o:
- um café, o café ✅
- uma café, a café ❌ (incorrect)
This is just grammatical gender: many nouns ending in -e can be either masculine or feminine, and café happens to be masculine.
Depois de normally needs a noun phrase after it. When that noun has a definite article, de + o contracts to do:
- depois de + o trabalho → depois do trabalho
This expression depois do trabalho is the normal way to say after work (after the workday / after I finish work).
Other options:
- depois de trabalhar = after working (verb, more literal process)
- depois do meu trabalho = after my work (more specific, e.g. after my shift, not someone else’s)
But depois do trabalho is the usual, idiomatic “after work”.
Yes, that’s possible and still natural:
- Depois do trabalho, nós vamos combinar um café.
- Depois do trabalho, vamos combinar um café.
Putting depois do trabalho first gives it a bit more emphasis on when it will happen, but the meaning is the same. In speech, you’d usually keep the original order, but both are fine.
Both are used in Portugal, with a subtle nuance:
- combinar um café – to agree informally to have a coffee sometime; it can be a bit looser, more about mutual intention.
- marcar um café – to set a specific time / date for a coffee, like scheduling an appointment.
In everyday talk they often overlap, but:
- Vamos combinar um café qualquer dia.
= Let’s (somehow) arrange a coffee one of these days. (vague) - Vamos marcar um café para sexta.
= Let’s schedule a coffee for Friday. (more concrete, fixed time)
No.
In Brazil, Vamos combinar… can be used as an idiom meaning roughly “let’s be honest / let’s agree on this point” before stating an opinion.
In this sentence in European Portuguese, vamos combinar is being used in its literal sense:
- Nós vamos combinar um café… = We’re going to arrange a coffee…
It’s about planning something together, not about “let’s be frank”.
Tense and time reference:
Nós vamos combinar um café…
= We’re going to arrange a coffee… (future / plan not yet fixed)Nós combinamos um café…
- As present: can mean We (usually) arrange a coffee… (habit) – less likely here.
- As simple past (especially in Brazil, but also possible in Portugal):
We arranged a coffee… (the arrangement is already made).
So:
- For a plan you’re making now for the future → vamos combinar.
- For a plan you already agreed on → past forms:
- Nós combinámos um café… (EP spelling & pronunciation, simple past)
- or Nós combinamos um café… in speech (which can sound like both present and past, depending on accent and context).
Nós vamos combinar um café depois do trabalho. is neutral‑informal:
- It’s perfectly fine with friends, colleagues, classmates.
In a very formal context (e.g. with a client, in a written business email), you might choose something slightly more formal:
- Podemos combinar um café depois do trabalho.
- Gostaria de combinar um café depois do trabalho.
But even then, combinar um café itself is still quite acceptable; it’s just friendly and casual.
Common alternatives in European Portuguese include:
Vamos tomar um café depois do trabalho.
Let’s have a coffee after work. (focus on actually going for coffee)Combinamos um café depois do trabalho?
Shall we arrange a coffee after work?Bora tomar um café depois do trabalho?
Very casual, youthful (especially bora), like Wanna grab a coffee after work?
Approximate IPA (Lisbon‑type accent):
- Nós vamos combinar um café depois do trabalho
/nɔʃ ˈvɐ.muʃ kõ.biˈnaɾ ũ kɐˈfɛ dɨˈpɔjʃ du tɾɐˈβa.ʎu/
Key points:
- nós → /nɔʃ/ (final s like English sh)
- vamos → /ˈvɐ.muʃ/ (unstressed a like a very short uh)
- combinar → co ≈ /kõ/ (nasal o), stress on -nar
- um → /ũ/ (nasal u)
- café → /kɐˈfɛ/ (stress on fé)
- depois → /dɨˈpɔjʃ/ (final s again like sh)
- trabalho → /tɾɐˈβa.ʎu/ (lh = palatal lh sound, like Italian gli)
In everyday fast speech, some vowels may reduce even more, but this is a good guide.