[1][2] Published throughout the lifetime of the Estado Novo dictatorship, when censorship was common, the Diário de Lisboa took more risks than most other papers and provided an outlet for some views considered controversial by the regime.

Features were included on the modern art of artists such as José de Almada Negreiros, Eduardo Viana, Sarah Affonso, and Mily Possoz and the paper also promoted their exhibitions.

On 2 May, a photograph of the crowd gathered at the Estádio 1º de Maio in Lisbon, estimated at 500,000, occupied almost the entire front page, with the heading "The united people will never be defeated".

In mid-May, Helena Neves, who belonged to the Central Committee of the Portuguese Communist Party, and had been arrested a few days before the Carnation Revolution, wrote about the humiliation, suffering and violence experienced by women.

[4] The end of the 1900s was a particularly difficult time for many newspapers in Portugal and the Diário de Lisboa was one of those forced by financial pressures to close down, publishing its last issue on 30 November 1990.