# How do you find public tenders in Portugal?

- Title: How to find public tenders in Portugal — Sinal
- URL: https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/answers/how-to-find-tenders-portugal
- Language: en
- Updated: 2026-10-25
- Alternate (pt-PT): https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/pt/respostas/como-encontrar-concursos-em-portugal (markdown: https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/pt/respostas/como-encontrar-concursos-em-portugal.md)
- Alternate (es-ES): https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/es/respuestas/como-encontrar-licitaciones-en-espana (markdown: https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/es/respuestas/como-encontrar-licitaciones-en-espana.md)

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Portuguese tenders are advertised in the Diário da República (the CCP requires a public [tender notice](https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/glossary/contract-notice) there, art. 130), on BASE.gov.pt, which centralises contract information and lets you search the notices published in the Diário da República, and in the Official Journal of the EU when the EU threshold is reached (art. 131). The tender documents and the proposals themselves go through the electronic platform used by the [contracting authority](https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/glossary/contracting-authority) (art. 62(1)).

Reviewed 25 October 2026 · Sinal team

## The official layers

- Diário da República: a public tender (concurso público) is advertised there through a notice (CCP art. 130(1)). BASE lists these under its announcements search.
- BASE.gov.pt: contracts formed by direct award or prior consultation must be published on the public contracts portal (CCP art. 127), and information on the formation and execution of public contracts is published there (art. 465(1)).
- Official Journal of the EU: required when the tender notice must be published at EU level (CCP art. 131(1)), with the thresholds in the answer on EU thresholds.

## The layer people miss

Direct award and prior consultation involve no open call: the authority invites the companies it chooses (CCP art. 112) and publishes the contract afterwards. For a small supplier, reading a nearby authority's contract history on BASE shows what it buys, from whom and at what price, which is a useful complement to the open notices.

A [prior information notice](https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/glossary/prior-information-notice) (art. 34) tells the market that tenders are coming in the next 12 months.

## Where can I see open public tenders in Portugal?

Open public tenders are advertised in the Diário da República (CCP art. 130(1)), and BASE lists them under its announcements search. When the notice must be published at EU level, it also appears in the Official Journal of the EU (art. 131(1)).

Primary sources

- [Código dos Contratos Públicos (Decreto-Lei 18/2008), consolidated text, Diário da República ↗](https://diariodarepublica.pt/dr/legislacao-consolidada/decreto-lei/2008-34455475) — art. 34, art. 62(1), art. 112, art. 127, arts. 130 and 131, art. 465(1) (read 25 October 2026)
- [Portal BASE (base.gov.pt) ↗](https://www.base.gov.pt/base4) — search types on the home page (read 25 October 2026)

General information, not legal advice. The notice and the applicable national law decide.

Sources

- [TED ↗](https://ted.europa.eu/)
- [BASE PT Anúncios ↗](https://www.base.gov.pt/)
- [BASE PT Modificações ↗](https://www.base.gov.pt/)

Read next

- [Counted in our data: Which IT awards in Sinal’s corpus have a stored end date in the next 12 months?](https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/field-notes/it-awards-with-a-stored-end-date)

### [What is the difference between BASE.gov.pt and PLACSP?](https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/answers/base-vs-placsp)

### [Can a company bid for public contracts across the Portugal–Spain border?](https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/answers/bidding-across-the-portugal-spain-border)

### [When must a tender be published in TED rather than only nationally?](https://sinal-pme.babete.pt/answers/eu-thresholds-2026)