99 Fun Facts About Brazil

What is the capital city of Brazil?

Brasília, a planned city inaugurated on 21 April 1960 under President Juscelino Kubitschek, was built to move the seat of government to Brazil's central plateau.

Which river, largely flowing through Brazil, is considered the largest by discharge volume globally?

The Amazon River, which flows predominantly through Brazil, holds the record as the world's largest river by discharge volume.

What is the official language of Brazil?

Portuguese is the official language of Brazil, making it the only Portuguese-speaking country in the Americas.

Which statue stands atop Corcovado mountain in Rio de Janeiro?

Christ the Redeemer, designed by French sculptor Paul Landowski and inaugurated in 1931, stands 30 metres tall on the 700-metre Corcovado peak.

Which is Brazil's largest state by area?

Amazonas covers about 1.56 million square kilometres, the largest of Brazil's states, ahead of Pará at roughly 1.25 million; its capital is Manaus.

Roughly what share of South America's land area does Brazil cover?

Brazil's 8.5 million square kilometres cover nearly half of South America's 17.8 million, making it the fifth-largest country in the world by area.

In what year did Brazil declare independence from Portugal?

Prince Pedro proclaimed independence with the Cry of Ipiranga on 7 September 1822, and 7 September remains Brazil's Independence Day.

What is the official currency of Brazil?

The Brazilian Real (BRL) is the official currency of Brazil, introduced in 1994 to stabilize the economy.

What traditional Brazilian stew is made with black beans and various cuts of pork and beef?

Feijoada, a rich stew of black beans with various salted and smoked meats, is widely regarded as Brazil's national dish.

What is widely considered the most popular sport in Brazil?

Football (soccer) is by far the most popular sport in Brazil, with the national team having won the FIFA World Cup multiple times.

Which architect designed many of the civic buildings of Brazil's planned capital, inaugurated in 1960?

Oscar Niemeyer designed Brasília's cathedral, National Congress and Planalto Palace; he also served on the design team for the United Nations headquarters and worked until his death at 104 in 2012.

Rio de Janeiro's Carnival, the biggest in the world, is held every year just before which Christian season?

Lent is the fasting season, so the party comes first. Rio's Carnival puts about two million people a day on the streets, more than any other Carnival anywhere.

What Afro-Brazilian martial art combines elements of dance, acrobatics, and music?

Capoeira is as much a game as a fight: fluid, acrobatic movements performed to musical accompaniment, with spirituality woven in.

What is the highest mountain peak in Brazil?

Pico da Neblina, meaning 'Mist Peak', is the highest mountain in Brazil, located in the state of Amazonas near the Venezuelan border.

What is the most populous city in Brazil?

São Paulo, with about 11.5 million residents in the 2022 census, is the most populous city in Brazil and in the whole of the Americas.

Which ocean borders Brazil to the east?

Brazil has an extensive coastline along its eastern border, entirely facing the Atlantic Ocean.

Which river is the longest entirely within Brazilian territory?

The São Francisco River is recognized as the longest river that flows entirely within Brazil's borders.

Roughly what share of the world's coffee does Brazil produce?

Brazil grows about a third of the world's coffee, roughly 60 million 60-kg bags a year, well ahead of Vietnam, the second-largest producer.

Which spirit, distilled from fermented sugarcane juice, is the base of Brazil's national cocktail, the caipirinha?

Cachaça is distilled from fermented sugar cane must and is the main ingredient of the national cocktail.

In Brazil's 2022 census, roughly how many people classified themselves as Indigenous?

The 2022 census counted about 1.7 million Indigenous people, 0.83% of Brazil's population, up from 896,917 in the 2010 census.

Which 1494 treaty divided newly discovered lands outside Europe between the two Iberian crowns?

The Treaty of Tordesillas, signed in 1494, drew a meridian 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde islands, which placed the eastern bulge of South America on Portugal's side.

Before the capital moved inland in 1960, which city had served as Brazil's capital since 1763?

Rio de Janeiro became the colonial capital in 1763 and remained the seat of government for nearly two centuries, until Brasília was inaugurated in 1960.

Which renowned waterfall system is located on the border between Brazil and Argentina?

The Iguazu Falls are a breathtaking series of waterfalls on the Iguazu River, forming a natural border between Brazil and Argentina.

The Pantanal, a vast tropical wetland, lies mostly in which Brazilian state?

About two-thirds of Brazil's Pantanal lies in Mato Grosso do Sul, with the rest in Mato Grosso; the wetland also extends into Bolivia and Paraguay.

Who was inaugurated as President of Brazil in January 2023?

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva became the first Brazilian to defeat an incumbent president and the first elected to a third term, beating Jair Bolsonaro in the October 2022 runoff.

How many stars appear on the flag of Brazil?

27 stars: 26 states plus the Federal District, a count that has grown as new states were created.

Which of these animals is considered Brazil's national animal?

The jaguar, the largest cat in the Americas, is the animal most widely cited as Brazil's national animal; the official national bird, named by decree in 2002, is the rufous-bellied thrush.

Which Brazilian author wrote 'Gabriela, Clove and Cinnamon' and 'Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands'?

Jorge Amado was a celebrated Brazilian writer whose novels, set in Bahia, often depicted the lives of ordinary people and explored themes of love, social justice, and folklore.

Which of these countries does NOT share a land border with Brazil?

Brazil shares land borders with every South American country except Chile and Ecuador.

Which Brazilian state is home to the colonial gold-mining city of Ouro Preto?

Minas Gerais is renowned for its rich history of gold mining and its well-preserved colonial towns, with Ouro Preto being a prime example and a UNESCO World Heritage site.

What is the drought-prone, semi-arid interior of Northeast Brazil called?

The Sertão is the semi-arid backlands of Northeast Brazil, where long, unpredictable droughts have shaped the region's poverty, migration and folklore.

Who was Brazil's first emperor, declaring independence and ruling until 1831?

Dom Pedro I proclaimed independence in 1822 and abdicated in April 1831 in favour of his five-year-old son, Pedro II, before sailing for Europe.

The Rio 2016 Games were the first Olympics ever held on which continent?

Rio 2016 brought the Olympic Games to South America for the first time; they were also the first Games held in a Portuguese-speaking country.

Which tropical savanna ecoregion covers about 21 percent of Brazil's land area?

The Cerrado, a savanna of about two million square kilometres across central Brazil, is the country's second-largest biome after the Amazon and extends slightly into Paraguay and Bolivia.

Which country was the primary colonizer of Brazil?

Portugal colonised Brazil after Pedro Álvares Cabral's fleet landed on 22 April 1500 and claimed the territory for the Portuguese crown.

What is Brazil's official long-form name under its 1988 constitution?

Brazil's official designation is the Federative Republic of Brazil, reflecting its federal system of government.

Which Brazilian state borders both Uruguay and Argentina?

Rio Grande do Sul, whose capital is Porto Alegre, is the only Brazilian state that borders Uruguay and also shares a frontier with Argentina.

Which island in the state of Pará is the second-largest island in South America?

Marajó, at the mouth of the Amazon, covers about 40,000 square kilometres, second in South America only to Tierra del Fuego, and is famous for its water-buffalo herds.

How long is Brazil's Atlantic coastline?

At 7,491 kilometers (4,655 miles), it ranks among the longest coastlines in the world.

Which Brazilian city is known as the 'Venice of Brazil' due to its numerous rivers and bridges?

Recife, the capital of Pernambuco, is often called the 'Venice of Brazil' because it is built on a network of rivers and islands, featuring many bridges.

Which Brazilian rhythm and dance is the sound of Carnival?

Samba, born in Rio de Janeiro's Afro-Brazilian communities in the early 20th century, is the music of Carnival; the city's samba schools parade to it in the Sambadrome.

Which Indigenous people, roughly 35,000 strong, live in villages straddling the Brazil–Venezuela border?

The Yanomami, about 35,000 people living in some 200 to 250 villages across the Brazil–Venezuela border, are among the largest relatively isolated Indigenous groups in South America.

Which Brazilian port city, the capital of Bahia, is known for its Afro-Brazilian culture?

Salvador, founded in 1549 as Brazil's first colonial capital, is the capital of Bahia and the historic centre of Afro-Brazilian culture and religion.

What is the massive hydroelectric dam on the Paraná shared by Brazil and Paraguay called?

The Itaipu Dam is one of the world's largest operational hydroelectric power plants, jointly owned and operated by Brazil and Paraguay on the Paraná River.

Which famous Brazilian musician is widely considered one of the pioneers of the Bossa Nova genre?

Antônio Carlos Jobim, often known as Tom Jobim, was a pivotal figure in the creation of Bossa Nova, composing many of its most enduring songs.

What is the Brazilian barbecue tradition called, in which cuts of beef, pork, sausage and chicken are grilled on skewers?

Churrasco is cooked on a purpose-built churrasqueira, a grill often fitted with supports for spits or skewers, over open flame or embers.

What is the longest mountain range in Brazil?

The Serra do Mar runs about 1,500 km along the Atlantic coast from Espírito Santo to Santa Catarina, the longest mountain system in Brazil.

Which is Brazil's northernmost state, whose capital Boa Vista lies entirely in the Northern Hemisphere?

Roraima is Brazil's northernmost state; its capital Boa Vista, at about 2.8°N, is the only Brazilian state capital lying entirely in the Northern Hemisphere.

Which of these major crops is NOT among Brazil's top agricultural exports?

Brazil is the world's largest exporter of soybeans and cane sugar and a top-two corn exporter, but it is a net wheat importer, buying much of its supply from Argentina.

The historical period of military rule in Brazil, which lasted for over two decades, ended in what year?

Brazil was under a military dictatorship from 1964 to 1985, after which civilian governance was restored.

The country's name most likely comes from the Portuguese word for what?

Pau-brasil, 'ember-red wood', was the colony's first export; European dyers paid handsomely for the deep red it produced.

Brazil is the only country crossed by both the equator and which other line of latitude?

Brazil is the only country crossed by both the equator and the Tropic of Capricorn; the Tropic passes through the city of São Paulo and the equator through Macapá.

How many time zones does Brazil span?

Brazil spans four time zones, from UTC-5 in Acre through UTC-4 and the national standard UTC-3 to UTC-2 on Fernando de Noronha and other Atlantic islands.

What official name did early Portuguese records give the territory that became Brazil?

Cabral's men first called it Ilha de Vera Cruz, soon Terra de Santa Cruz, the 'Land of the Holy Cross'; merchants instead said Terra do Brasil after the dyewood they shipped home.

Brazil has the world's largest population of which religious group?

Catholics made up 56.7 percent of Brazilians in the 2022 census, the largest Catholic population of any country; evangelical Protestants were 26.9 percent.

Which princess signed the 1888 Golden Law that abolished slavery in Brazil?

Princess Isabel signed the Lei Áurea on 13 May 1888 while acting as regent during her father Pedro II's trip to Europe; Pope Leo XIII awarded her the Golden Rose for it.

The Portuguese royal court fled to Brazil in 1807 to escape whose invading army?

Napoleon's army under General Junot marched on Lisbon in November 1807, and the Braganza court sailed for Rio de Janeiro, which then governed the Portuguese empire until 1821.

King John's 1815 united kingdom joined Brazil, the mother country and which third realm?

The 1815 United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves raised Brazil from colony to kingdom; the Algarves, Portugal's southern region, had carried a nominal kingdom title since the 13th century.

How did President Getúlio Vargas's second term end in August 1954?

He shot himself with a revolver in his third-floor bedroom at Catete Palace. Vargas had governed from 1930 to 1945 and again from 1951.

Which Paraguayan president was killed by Brazilian forces at Cerro Corá in 1870?

Francisco Solano López was killed by Brazilian troops at Cerro Corá on 1 March 1870, ending the six-year War of the Triple Alliance.

Which trade did Inconfidência Mineira martyr Joaquim José da Silva Xavier practise?

Joaquim José da Silva Xavier practised dentistry, earning the nickname Tiradentes, 'tooth puller'; he was hanged in Rio de Janeiro on 21 April 1792 and is now a national hero.

Machado de Assis founded and first presided over which institution in 1897?

Machado de Assis was the founding president of the Brazilian Academy of Letters, established in Rio de Janeiro in 1897 on the model of the Académie française; he led it until his death in 1908.

In which city did the 14-bis make its 60-metre hop on 23 October 1906?

Alberto Santos-Dumont's 14-bis, nicknamed 'Oiseau de proie', took off unaided from the Bagatelle field in Paris on 23 October 1906 and flew about 60 metres.

Which jeweller made a 1904 wristwatch for a Brazilian aviator who needed both hands free?

Louis Cartier designed the wristwatch for Alberto Santos-Dumont in 1904 so he could read the time without taking his hands off the controls; Cartier's Santos line is named for him.

Carmen Miranda's towering Hollywood headdresses were famously piled with what?

Carmen Miranda's trademark turbans were piled with fruit, bananas above all, as in 'The Lady in the Tutti Frutti Hat' from the 1943 film The Gang's All Here.

Who scored the goal that beat Brazil in the deciding match of the 1950 World Cup?

Alcides Ghiggia scored Uruguay's winner in the 79th minute of the 1950 decider at the Maracanã; he died in 2015 as the last surviving player from that match.

What made the 1950 World Cup hosted by Brazil unique in how its winner was decided?

The 1950 winner came from a four-team round-robin group of Uruguay, Brazil, Sweden and Spain; Brazil needed only a draw in the last game but lost 2–1 to Uruguay.

Brazil's 7–1 semi-final defeat to Germany in 2014 was played at which stadium?

The 7–1 was played at the Mineirão in Belo Horizonte on 8 July 2014; it was Brazil's first competitive home defeat since 1975 and the heaviest the team had ever suffered at a World Cup.

Pelé is the all-time top scorer of which club, with 643 goals in 659 games?

Pelé joined Santos at 15 in 1956 and scored 643 goals in 659 official games for the club, winning the Copa Libertadores and Intercontinental Cup in both 1962 and 1963.

How old was Pelé when he won his first World Cup in 1958?

Pelé, born 23 October 1940, was 17 when Brazil beat Sweden 5–2 in the 1958 final in Stockholm, a match in which he scored twice.

What is the nickname of Brazil's men's national soccer team?

The 'little canary' tag comes from the yellow shirt; the team dropped white as its default kit after the 1950 defeat at home.

How many FIFA World Cups had Brazil's men's team won after its 2002 triumph?

Brazil's fifth title came in 2002 in Japan and South Korea, after 1958, 1962, 1970 and 1994, making it the first nation to win five World Cups.

In which country did the Brazilian Expeditionary Force fight during World War II?

The roughly 25,000-strong Brazilian Expeditionary Force fought in Italy from 1944, alongside the US 10th Mountain Division in the Apennines, taking Monte Castello and Montese in 1945.

What was the nickname of Brazil's World War II expeditionary force?

The Smoking Snakes (Cobras Fumantes) mocked the saying that a snake would sooner smoke a pipe than Brazil send troops to Europe; the force's insignia shows a pipe-smoking snake.

Henry Ford's failed rubber town Fordlândia sits on the banks of which Amazon tributary?

Fordlândia lies on the Tapajós River in Pará; Ford received a 10,000 square kilometre concession in 1928, moved operations downriver to Belterra in 1934 and sold out in 1945.

What nickname did rubber wealth earn Manaus around 1900?

Rubber wealth made Manaus the 'Paris of the Tropics': the Teatro Amazonas opera house opened in 1896 and electric trams ran through the rainforest city before the boom collapsed.

What did Henry Wickham smuggle from the Amazon to Kew Gardens in 1876?

Henry Wickham shipped some 70,000 rubber tree seeds from Santarém to Kew Gardens in 1876; plantations in British Malaya and Ceylon grown from that stock undercut wild Amazon rubber by the 1910s.

The Pororoca, which surfers ride up the Amazon, is what kind of phenomenon?

The Pororoca is a tidal bore: at spring tides the incoming Atlantic pushes a wave up to 4 metres high as far as 800 kilometres up the Amazon, reversing the river's flow with an audible roar.

Which future president led the team behind the 1994 Plano Real that ended hyperinflation?

Fernando Henrique Cardoso, finance minister under Itamar Franco, assembled the economists behind the Plano Real, launched in July 1994, and rode its success to two presidential terms from 1995 to 2002.

Petrobras was created in 1953 under which slogan?

Petrobras was born of the nationalist 'O petróleo é nosso' ('The oil is ours') campaign; the state company was created by law on 3 October 1953 under President Getúlio Vargas.

Which Japanese judoka taught Carlos Gracie in 1917, seeding Brazilian jiu-jitsu?

Maeda had left Japan in 1904 to take on wrestlers and boxers worldwide; a Belém circus co-owned by Gastão Gracie introduced him to the crowd in 1916.

Guaraná seeds, used in Brazilian soft drinks, can contain up to what share of caffeine?

Guaraná seeds hold up to about 6 percent caffeine by weight, several times the 1 to 3 percent in green coffee beans; the plant uses it as a natural insecticide.

Which 1928 Tarsila do Amaral painting inspired the Anthropophagic Manifesto?

Tarsila painted Abaporu as a birthday gift for her husband Oswald de Andrade in January 1928; its Tupi name means 'man who eats', and it sparked his Anthropophagic Manifesto.

The Kasato Maru arrived in 1908 carrying Brazil's first immigrants from which country?

The Kasato Maru docked at Santos on 18 June 1908 with 781 Japanese immigrants bound for São Paulo coffee farms; Brazil went on to build the largest Japanese-descended community outside Japan.

How many FIFA world player of the year awards did Marta win between 2006 and 2018?

Marta won the award six times, five in a row from 2006 to 2010 and again in 2018; she is also Brazil's all-time top international scorer, ahead of Neymar and Pelé.

Gustavo Kuerten won all three of his Grand Slam singles titles at which tournament?

Gustavo Kuerten won the French Open in 1997 as an unseeded world No. 66, then again in 2000 and 2001; the 1997 title was his first ATP title of any kind.

Which nine-suite series did Villa-Lobos compose between 1930 and 1945?

Villa-Lobos composed the nine Bachianas Brasileiras between 1930 and 1945, blending Bach-style counterpoint with Brazilian folk idioms; No. 5 for soprano and eight cellos is the best known.

In the Afro-Brazilian religion Candomblé, what are the venerated spirits called?

In Candomblé the orixás are Yoruba-derived deities such as Oxalá, Iemanjá and Xangô; each person has a tutelary orixá, and under colonial pressure they were syncretised with Catholic saints.

At which circuit was Ayrton Senna killed during the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix?

Senna crashed at Imola's Tamburello corner on 1 May 1994 while leading in the Williams FW16; his 65 pole positions were then a record.

Planemaker Embraer is headquartered in which city?

Embraer was founded by the Brazilian state in 1969 in São José dos Campos, in São Paulo state, beside the ITA aeronautics institute, and was privatised in 1994.

Lúcio Costa's master plan for the 1960 capital is often said to be laid out in what shape?

Brasília's Plano Piloto is usually likened to an airplane, its 'wings' the residential axis and its 'fuselage' the Monumental Axis; Costa himself described the two crossing axes as a cross marking possession.

A 2014 study traced the Amazon's most distant source to which Peruvian river?

For almost a century the honour had gone to the Apurímac on Nevado Mismi; the change feeds the long fight over whether the Amazon outranks the Nile.

Which state holds the Lençóis national park, a dune field dotted with rainwater lagoons?

Lençóis Maranhenses National Park lies in Maranhão near Barreirinhas; impermeable rock beneath the sand stops the pools draining, so the rainy season turns the dunes into thousands of lakes.

The great 17th-century quilombo of Palmares stood in what is today which state?

Palmares centred on the Serra da Barriga in what is now Alagoas; its last leader, Zumbi, was betrayed and beheaded on 20 November 1695, a date now marked as Black Consciousness Day.

Which rodent gnaws open the Brazil nut's hard capsule and buries the seeds?

The agouti, a large rodent with chisel-like teeth, is almost the only animal able to open the Brazil nut's capsule; seedlings from its forgotten caches can lie dormant for years until a tree fall lets in light.

Emperor Pedro II, who reigned from 1831 to 1889, was known by which epithet?

Pedro II, 'the Magnanimous', inherited the throne at five in 1831 and reigned for 58 years, the longest in Brazilian history, before accepting exile without a fight in 1889.

Which successor to Kubitschek resigned the presidency in 1961 after less than a year?

Jânio Quadros took office on 31 January 1961 and resigned on 25 August the same year; vice-president João Goulart succeeded him and was deposed by the 1964 coup.

Which president, elected in 1989, was impeached by Brazil's Congress in 1992?

Fernando Collor, a former Alagoas governor, won Brazil's first direct presidential election since 1960 but was removed in December 1992 over a corruption scheme; vice-president Itamar Franco succeeded him.

The volcanic archipelago of Fernando de Noronha belongs to which Brazilian state?

Fernando de Noronha is a state district of Pernambuco, though it lies closer to Natal; its 21 islands became a national marine park in 1988 and a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2001.