Different words for "a lot"

Portuguese Questions Grammar
1

Olá,

I’m wondering what the rules are around the words “muito”, “bastante” and “demais”? Because I always find myself using “muito” by default with the flash cards and sometimes this isn’t right!

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2

Basically, muito means a lot, bastante means enough or a fair amount, and demais means too much.

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3

Thanks for the clarification :grin:

4

Olá, @Tom. The following Learning Notes cover this topic:

Bastante can be translated as enough or plenty, but also very or many/a lot. In these latter senses, it’s pretty much interchangeable with muito. Demais, on the other hand, is always one degree higher than both (meaning not just a lot, but really too much, like @azafran341 said).

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Thank you for the links to the learning notes! I’ll give them a read tonight.

6

Thanks for the learning notes - I came here looking for an explanation for the difference between demais and demasiado.

Have you got anything for the differnce between muito and tanto…?

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@stewart_ryan89, you’re welcome! Muito and tanto are discussed here: Existential Quantifiers: Many, Few, Some | Practice Portuguese

Tanto is more emphatic, meaning so/so much/so many…:

  • Gosto muito de ti. = I like you very much.
  • Gosto tanto de ti. = I like you so much.
  • Não é saudável comer muito. = It’s not healthy to eat a lot.
  • Não é saudável comer tanto. = It’s not healthy to eat that much.
  • Há muita gente aqui. = There are many people here.
  • Há tanta gente aqui. = There are so many people here.
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