What does “cadê” mean in Brazilian Portuguese?

Cadê is the Brazilian way to ask where something is, and it needs no verb at all: cadê você?, cadê o meu celular?. That is because it was never a question word to begin with — it is the worn-down remains of the old phrase que é de…? (“what has become of…?”), which slid to quedê and then to cadê. The verb is already baked inside it.

So cadê meu irmão? is complete exactly as it stands; adding está is a classic learner slip. It is informal but no longer slangy — dictionaries list it. Portugal prefers onde está?, and some older Brazilians still say quedê. In the clip a small boy phones his mother with the purest possible version: oi mamãe, já chegou, cadê você?