fazem

Fazem is the third-person plural present indicative form of the Portuguese verb fazer, meaning they do or they make. It is used with plural subjects such as eles or elas to describe actions that are happening in the present or are treated as habitual in everyday speech.

Etymology and form: Fazer derives from the Latin facere. In modern Portuguese, the present indicative forms show irregularities in the stem for some persons. For the third-person plural, the form is fazem, built from the stem faz- plus the ending -em. Other present indicative forms include faço, fazes, faz, fazemos, fazeis, and fazem for the corresponding subjects. The form fazem is distinct from the present subjunctive 3rd person plural faizam? No, the present subjunctive is façam (written with a diacritic) in Portuguese, which is easily confused with fazem in pronunciation and spelling in some dialects.

Usage notes: Fazem appears in a wide range of contexts, including everyday activity, production, and realization of actions. It can indicate both concrete actions and general statements about what a group does. In questions, it often appears as "O que eles fazem?" and in responses, "Eles fazem pão todos os dias." The verb is commonly used in Brazilian Portuguese and is also standard in European Portuguese.

Examples: Eles fazem o relatório hoje. They are making the report today. O que eles fazem agora? What are they doing now? Eles fazem pão aos domingos. They bake bread on Sundays.

See also: fazer (the base verb), conjugation of fazer, and basic Portuguese verbs.

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