Whats the difference between “onde fica” vs “onde esta”
Some “what” questions start with “que” but others with “o que”.
Not an expert, only from what I saw:
1. Onde fica VS Onde está (notice the está instead of esta):
Fica will mostly be for map-like, permanent locations. “Onde fica Lisboa?”, “Onde fica o museu?”.
Immediately there are nuances, and even in Smart Review you can find the sentence “As ilhas estão no Oceano Atlântico”. Islands in the Atlantic Ocean are permanent and it’s a geographic location so I’m not sure when to use what. I think you can use “Onde está a entrada do museu?” for example when you are in the area and just need a quick direction to the entrance.
Está is more for people and movable objects and you’re asking about their current location: “Onde está o João?”, “Onde está o telemóvel?”.
2. Questions starting with “Que” instead of “O que”:
Without “O”, a “Que” question is more like “Which X” instead of “What is that you chose to blabla”. Que without “O que” must be followed by a noun: “Que livro queres?”.
“O que” is already a kind of a noun (I can’t explain it in my level), followed by a verb, and like a “description” of what you’re asking about: “What did you tell me yesterday?”
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@simplymrr, to complement @jonatas’s reply, as a simple rule of thumb, you can use Onde fica? and Onde está? rather interchangeably to ask about the location of an immovable object. Speaking in general, I would say Onde fica? might be the best one to use by default, but Onde está? can also sound pretty natural for us.
For movable objects, it becomes more important to distinguish between them. Onde fica? would only be used for the theoretical/default location of such an object, while Onde está? would only be used to ask about its current location.
Some examples of all this:
-
Onde fica Espanha? / Espanha fica na Europa. (Where is Spain? / Spain is in Europe) → fixed location of an immovable object
-
Onde fica o livro? / O livro fica ali. (~Where do you keep the book? / The book is [kept] over there.) → theoretical/default location of a movable object (e.g. where it’s supposed to be stored)
-
Onde está o livro? / O livro está ali. (Where is the book [right now]? / The book is [currently] over there) → current location of a movable object
Regarding que vs o que, strictly in the context of questions, you can consider them interchangeable (meaning that o is optional) except when que is followed by a noun, in which case it should never have o at the start. For example:
- Que é isto? = O que é isto? (both equally correct)
- Que livro é este? (only acceptable option because of the noun)
In terms of usage patterns, generally speaking, we tend to add o more often than not 
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Obrigada! Very helpful
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