O condicional (futuro do pretérito)
If the futuro do presente (lesson 20) is 'will', the condicional is 'would'. Eu falaria com ele = I would speak with him. Comeríamos pizza = we would eat pizza. The endings ride on the full infinitive — no swapping verb families — so once you know the pattern, you've got every regular verb. The condicional is the polite tense, the hypothetical tense, and the 'future-as-seen-from-the-past' tense.
Endings — same on every regular verb
Take the FULL infinitive and add -ia, -ias, -ia, -íamos, -ieis, -iam. The accent on íamos is required. falar → falaria, falarias, falaria, falaríamos, falaríeis, falariam. comer → comeria, comerias, comeria, comeríamos, comeríeis, comeriam. partir → partiria, partirias, partiria, partiríamos, partiríeis, partiriam. The eu and 3rd-singular forms are spelled identically (eu falaria / ele falaria) — context disambiguates.
The same three irregulars as the future
Just like the futuro do presente, only three verbs trim their stem; the endings are still regular. dizer → diria, dirias, diria, diríamos, diriam. fazer → faria, farias, faria, faríamos, fariam. trazer → traria, trarias, traria, traríamos, trariam. Everything else — ser, ter, ir, estar, ver, dar — is regular: seria, teria, iria, estaria, veria, daria.
Polite use — the everyday job
Soften any request by swapping the present for the condicional. Quero um café → Queria um café (lesson 18 imperfeito) or Gostaria de um café = I'd like a coffee. Pode ajudar-me? → Poderia ajudar-me? = Could you help me? Importava-se? / Importar-se-ia? = Would you mind? In PT cafés and shops, gostaria de + infinitive or noun is a near-default polite frame. Brazilian register: same idea, but the present tense (quero) and the imperfeito (queria) crowd out the condicional in spoken use.
Hypothetical — 'if I had time'
Pair the condicional with se + a past hypothetical (the imperfeito do conjuntivo, which you'll meet later) to talk about unreal situations. Se tivesse tempo, iria contigo = If I had time, I'd go with you. Se fosse rico, comprava uma casa no Algarve — note the everyday substitution: in spoken PT and BR, the imperfeito do indicativo (comprava) often replaces the condicional in the main clause. Both are accepted in casual speech.
Future-in-the-past
Reported speech often pulls the future back into the condicional. Direct: 'Vou ligar' = 'I'll call'. Reported: Ela disse que ligaria = She said she would call. Direct: 'Faremos o jantar'. Reported: Eles disseram que fariam o jantar. Same logic as English 'will' → 'would' under a past reporting verb.
Brazilian everyday: ia + infinitive instead
In Brazilian everyday speech, the full condicional often drops in favor of ia + infinitivo — basically the imperfeito of ir plus the bare infinitive. Iria comer (textbook) → Ia comer (Brazilian everyday). Nós faríamos isso → A gente ia fazer isso. This is grammatically the imperfeito of ir, but functionally it covers the same 'would' ground. PT also uses ia + infinitivo but mostly for 'was going to' (a near-future-in-the-past), not as a free swap for the condicional. When in doubt in writing, use the -ia condicional form.
