What vocabulary do I need for the CIPLE A2 exam?
Everyday European Portuguese, not academic language. Transport, shops, food, health, housing, work, family and daily routine. The texts are signs, messages, notices and short personal stories, so the useful vocabulary is what you would meet living an ordinary week in Portugal.
Where the words come from
The reading paper is built from real-world material: a pharmacy's opening hours, a bus-ticket rule, a library notice, a text message about a broken heater, a short description of someone's week.
So the vocabulary that pays is the vocabulary of ordinary life. Not literary Portuguese, not business Portuguese, not the specialised terms of your own profession.
The categories worth systematic attention
- Time and dates. Days, months, opening hours, de segunda a sexta, a partir de, até. These decide answers in notice questions constantly.
- Prices, quantities and numbers. Same reason.
- Transport. Tickets, stops, delays, schedules.
- Shops and services. Pharmacy, post office, bank, appointments.
- Housing. Rent, landlord, repairs, utilities.
- Health. Appointments, symptoms, prescriptions.
- Work and study. Schedules, colleagues, simple arrangements.
- Family and routine. The everyday speaking topics, which overlap heavily with the writing tasks.
The small words that decide questions
This is where marks are actually won and lost, and it is not really vocabulary size.
Só, não, exceto, apenas, sempre, nunca, antes, depois. Negatives and restrictions flip the meaning of a notice, and the wrong answer option is usually the one you would pick if you skimmed past one of them.
Make sure the words are European
If your Portuguese came from Brazilian sources, the everyday categories above are exactly where the two varieties diverge. Learning the right word for a bus or a bathroom matters more here than expanding your vocabulary in general.
How to actually retain it
Spaced review beats rereading lists. Words resurface on a schedule set by how well you know them, so your time goes to the ones you keep forgetting. That is how our vocabulary review works, and it is included with a subscription.