Portuguese is a Romance language. It evolved over centuries in Portugal, but is now natively spoken in many countries, including Brazil, Angola, and Cape Verde. According to the eLinguistics.net analysis using specific software modules to assess linguistic relationships, the five languages most similar to Portuguese are Catalan, Spanish, Italian, French, and Piedmontese.
- Catalan (90.4)
Catalan is another language commonly spoken on the Iberian peninsula, primarily in Catalonia. Catalan shares many lexical similarities with Portuguese. Additionally, the grammar and syntax of Catalan exhibit many parallels to those of Portuguese, such as the use of similar verb conjugations and sentence structures. - Spanish (83.3)
Spain borders Portugal, so it is no surprise Spanish makes this list. It share a high degree of mutual intelligibility with Portuguese, particularly in written form. Both evolved from Vulgar Latin, and many words in Portuguese and Spanish are either identical or very similar. For example, the Portuguese word “amigo” (friend) corresponds directly to the Spanish “amigo.” However, the pronunciation, especially of vowels and certain consonants, can differ significantly. - Italian (81.7)
Italian, another Romance language, shares a significant amount of vocabulary and grammatical structure with Portuguese. Both languages maintain a strong link to their Latin origins, which results in shared cognates. Italian and Portuguese have similar vowel systems and a preference for preserving the original Latin vowel sounds. For example, the Portuguese word “família” (family) and the Italian “famiglia” are quite close. - French (72.9)
French, although more distantly related to Portuguese than Spanish, Catalan, or Italian, it still shares a notable amount of vocabulary and grammatical features with Portuguese. Both languages underwent significant phonological changes from their Latin roots, yet they maintain a close connection in terms of sentence structure and lexical choices. French has influenced Portuguese, particularly in terms of vocabulary, especially in areas such as politics, art, and cuisine. - Piedmontese (69.1)
Piedmontese is spoken in Northern Italy. As with other Romance languages, Piedmontese developed from Vulgar Latin, and it retains many of the same linguistic features found in Portuguese. However, the mutual intelligibility between Piedmontese and Portuguese is relatively low, primarily due to Piedmontese’s unique phonological and lexical characteristics.
(to be considered for the list, the language must be spoken by at least one million people)