Definition
To arrive at a place, or to reach a point in time or in a process.
Example
Ela chegou em casa muito tarde ontem.
Show translation
She arrived home very late yesterday.
Etymology
From Latin *plicāre* ("to fold, to bend toward"), which in Vulgar Latin developed into the sense of "drawing near" or "pulling up to a place." The same root gives Portuguese *dobrar* (to fold) and Italian *piegare*. The phonetic journey from *plicāre* → *chegar* involved the characteristic Ibero-Romance shift of Latin *pl-* to the palatal affricate, later settling as the *ch-* sound in Portuguese.
Cultural note
In Brazilian Portuguese, *chegar* is extremely versatile in everyday speech. Beyond physical arrival, it frequently appears in colloquial constructions: *chegar junto* means to show solidarity or loyalty to a friend, and *já chegou!* ("it already arrived!") is casually used to mean something is perfect or more than enough. On July 9th — Brazil's Constitutionalist Revolution Day (*Revolução Constitucionalista*) — the phrase *chegou a hora* ("the hour has come") carries particular historical resonance.