El encuentro fue breve.

In Spanish, singular countable nouns usually need an article or some other determiner. So encuentro by itself often sounds incomplete.

• el encuentro = the meeting / the encounter
• un encuentro = a meeting / an encounter

Using el suggests that the speaker has a specific meeting in mind, one that is already known from the context.

Not always. Encuentro can mean several related things, depending on context:

• meeting
• encounter
• match / fixture in sports
• sometimes a more chance-like meeting or coming together

In this sentence, it most naturally means something like the meeting or the encounter. It is a bit broader than reunión, which is often a more formal meeting.

This is one of the most common questions learners ask.

Both fue and era can mean was, but they are used differently:

• fue = preterite, presenting the event as completed
• era = imperfect, giving background, description, or an ongoing past situation

In El encuentro fue breve, fue treats the meeting as a finished event and sums it up as brief.

So this sounds like:

• The meeting was brief.
• It happened, it ended, and now the speaker is describing it as a whole.

If you said El encuentro era breve, it would sound less natural in most contexts, because brief is usually the kind of thing you say about the completed event rather than as background.

Fue is the third person singular preterite form of ser.

Here it means:

• he/she/it was
• or with a singular noun: it was

Since el encuentro is singular, Spanish uses fue.

A useful extra point: fue is also the same form of ir (went), but here it clearly comes from ser because it is followed by the adjective breve.

Normally, no. Ser is the natural verb here.

With adjectives like breve, Spanish usually uses ser to describe the nature or overall characterization of something:

• El encuentro fue breve.

Using estar with breve would sound unusual here. Estar is more commonly used for states or conditions, but brief in this sentence is not really a temporary state of the meeting; it is a way of characterizing the whole event.

So:

• fue breve = natural
• estuvo breve = generally not what you would say

Because breve is an adjective that has the same form for masculine and feminine singular.

Compare:

• el encuentro fue breve
• la reunión fue breve

In both cases, it stays breve.

It does change in the plural:

• el encuentro fue breve
• los encuentros fueron breves

So breve is:

• singular: breve
• plural: breves

In this sentence, breve is not directly modifying the noun inside the noun phrase. It is part of the predicate after ser.

Structure:

• El encuentro = subject
• fue = verb
• breve = predicate adjective

So it works like:

• The meeting was brief

This is different from saying:

• un breve encuentro = a brief meeting

Both are possible, but they are different structures:

• El encuentro fue breve = full sentence
• un breve encuentro = noun phrase

Yes, but there is a nuance.

• breve often sounds a bit more natural for events, conversations, speeches, visits, meetings, etc.
• corto literally means short, and it can also work, but it may sound a little more physical or straightforward.

So:

• El encuentro fue breve = very natural
• El encuentro fue corto = understandable, but often breve is the better choice for this kind of context

You will hear breve a lot with things like:

• una conversación breve
• una visita breve
• una pausa breve

It depends on context.

• encuentro = a meeting/encounter in a broad sense
• reunión = meeting, often more organized or formal
• cita = appointment, date, arranged one-to-one meeting

So if the sentence is about two people meeting, encuentro can work well. If it is about a business meeting, reunión might be more specific. If it is an appointment, cita would often be better.

For example:

• La reunión fue breve = The meeting was brief
• La cita fue breve = The appointment/date was brief
• El encuentro fue breve = The encounter/meeting was brief

A clear Spain pronunciation would be approximately:

el en-KWEN-tro fue BRE-ve

A bit more closely:

• El → like ell, but short
• encuentro → en-KWEN-tro
• fue → roughly fweh
• breve → BREH-veh

A few pronunciation notes:

• In encuentro, the cu gives a kw sound.
• The r in encuentro is a single tap, not a strong rolled rr.
• In much of Spain, b and v sound very similar, so breve is not pronounced with a strong English v.

Normally, no. That would sound ungrammatical in standard Spanish.

Spanish usually requires an article with a singular countable noun when you mean a specific thing:

• El encuentro fue breve.
• Un encuentro fue breve.

Leaving it out is not the normal pattern here.

The plural would be:

Los encuentros fueron breves.

Changes:

• el → los
• encuentro → encuentros
• fue → fueron
• breve → breves

So everything agrees with the plural subject.