Portuguese Polite Expressions – Desculpa vs. Com licença vs. Por Favor

At the beginning of their learning journey, many Portuguese language learners struggle to discern between expressions such as Desculpa, Com licença, or Por favor, namely, when to use either.

These are so-called “politeness” expressions and, as their name implies, help you sound more polite. It is therefore important that you understand and use them well. Hopefully, this short blog post will bring some light to it. Read on.

Desculpa

Desculpa in Portuguese can mean “sorry” or “excuse me” depending on the context. Sure enough, when we mean one or the other, our intonation and tone of voice change accordingly.

Let’s look at a few examples for each case.

Sorry

Desculpa! Não foi por querer.
I’m sorry. It was not on purpose.

Excuse me

Desculpa, sabes que horas são?
Excuse me, do you know what’s the time?

Desculpa vs. Desculpe

You may sometimes hear Desculpa, sometimes Desculpe. The difference between the two is that the former is informal (tu) and the latter formal (você).

Perdão = Desculpe

In formal contexts, you may hear Perdão instead of Desculpe – they mean the same thing. Keep in mind, though, that Perdão is only used as “sorry” and never as “excuse me”.

Com licença

Com licença means “excuse me,” just like Desculpe (formal). Let’s look at a few examples:

Com licença, posso passar?
Excuse me, could I get through?

Com licença, posso entrar?
Excuse me, can I come in?

Por favor

Por favor means “please”. We say Por favor mainly in two situations – when being polite and when begging for something.

Being polite/courteous

Um café, por favor.
An espresso, please.

Entre, por favor.
Please come in.

Por favor = (Se) faz favor

Se faz favor (oftentimes, we drop that se at the beginning) is a variant of Por favor. Both are commonplace and interchangeable:

Um café, por favor. = Um café, faz favor.

Now, when someone is delivering or bringing something to you (e.g. a waiter at the coffee shop), they will oftentimes say Faz favor as in “There you go”:

Faz favor, aqui está o seu café.
There you go, here’s your coffee.

Begging

The other Por favor is when you are begging for something:

Por favor, não faça isso.
Please, don’t do that.

Note that in this context, you only use Por favor (and never Se faz favor)