palaavat

Palaavat is the present tense, third-person plural form of the Finnish verb palata, meaning to return or come back. It is used with plural subjects, such as people or groups, and can describe both literal returns (returning home) and figurative returns (returning to a topic or a state).

Grammatical note: In Finnish, present indicative forms use specific endings for each person. For the third person plural, the ending is -vat or -vät depending on vowel harmony. Since the stem vowel is a back vowel, the form is palaavat. The full present tense conjugation of palata is: minä palaan, sinä palaat, hän palaa, me palaamme, te palaatte, he palaavat.

Examples of use include: He palaavat kotiin illalla. The sentence conveys that they will return home in the evening. Another example: Lennot palaavat aikataulun mukaan huomenna, meaning the flights return to schedule tomorrow.

Etymology and related forms: The verb palata comes from Finnic origins and is a common, core verb in Finnish. It is intransitive, describing a subject returning to a place or state. A related but transitive verb is palauttaa, meaning to return something or to hand back, which is used when an object is being returned rather than the subject returning. Other finite forms of palata include palaan, palaat, palaa, palaamme, palaatte, and palaavat, corresponding to the respective persons and numbers.