ríen

Ríen is the present indicative form of the Spanish verb reír, used with third-person plural subjects: ellos, ellas, or ustedes. It denotes that multiple people laugh in the moment of speaking. The word is pronounced with the stress on the first syllable: rí-en.

Reír is an irregular verb in the present tense. Its other present forms include río, ríes, ríe, reímos, reís, and ríen. The forms carry an accent on the í to indicate the correct stress. The stem vowel changes to dí?no, the stem is typically seen as rí- across the present tenses except for adjustments in the nosotros form, where the accent remains on the i (reímos) and in vosotros (reís). The past participle is reído, and the infinitive is reír.

Usage notes: ríen describes an action performed by a group, often in response to humor, a joke, or a situation that elicits laughter. It can appear in narrative or descriptive contexts, and it agrees with the subject in number and person. Although commonly used with ustedes in Latin America and with ellos/ellas in many contexts, in Spain the vocative vosotros form would be reís for the second person plural, while ríen remains the form for ustedes/ellos/ellas.

Etymology: reír derives from Latin ridēre, meaning to laugh. The modern Spanish forms retain the root recesses that produce the distinctive accented rí- across multiple present-tense forms.