eles

Eles is the third-person plural masculine subject pronoun in Portuguese and Galician. It is used to refer to a group that is all male or a mixed-gender group, while the feminine counterpart is elas. In both languages, it functions as the subject of a sentence.

In Portuguese, eles is employed in everyday speech and writing to designate “they.” It agrees with verbs in number and person, as in eles são meus amigos (they are my friends) or eles foram ao cinema (they went to the cinema). The feminine plural form is elas, used when referring exclusively to a group of females, as in Elas são amigas. In formal or careful style, the pronoun can be omitted when the verb conjugation already marks the subject.

In Galician, eles serves a parallel role as the masculine plural third-person subject pronoun, with elas as the feminine counterpart. The verb form likewise changes to reflect plurality. An example is Eles son estudantes (They are students).

The pronoun is typically placed before the verb in affirmative statements in both languages, though Portuguese, like many Romance languages, allows flexible word order for emphasis or stylistic reasons. Eles also appears in various compound verb constructions and can be combined with enclitic or tonic pronouns when needed, following standard grammar rules of Portuguese and Galician.