Ridere: Full Conjugation

Ridere (to laugh) is the verb of one of the most universal human acts, and Italian gives it a paradigm that rewards careful study. The present tense is regular, but two surprises lurk further on: the passato remoto is a strong perfect with the -si pattern (risi, rise, risero), and the participle is the wholly irregular riso — not riduto, not riso with a long vowel, just riso, which doubles as the noun "laughter" and (homophonously) "rice." The auxiliary in compound tenses is avere (ho riso molto, "I laughed a lot"), the standard choice for verbs of expressive action.

The semantic territory of ridere is wider than the English "laugh." It covers laughing aloud, chuckling, smiling broadly, mocking, and figuratively shining: gli occhi le ridevano ("her eyes were laughing"). The pronominal ridersela ("to laugh it off, to mock") and the causative far ridere ("to be funny, to make someone laugh") are everyday tools of conversation. Once you have the conjugation paradigm and the half-dozen core idioms in muscle memory, you have a verb that lives at the centre of every social Italian moment.

Indicativo presente

The present is fully regular, with stress on the -i- root vowel in singular forms (RI-do, RI-di, RI-de) and forward-shifting stress in the 1pl and 2pl (ri-DIA-mo, ri-DE-te). The 3pl ridono keeps root stress (RI-do-no), the standard pattern. The verb is one of those reassuring -ere verbs that looks neat in the present and only reveals its irregularities in the strong perfect and participle.

The construction ridere di qualcosa / qualcuno ("to laugh at something / someone") is the standard pattern. Stiamo ridendo di una battuta ("we're laughing at a joke"), ridevano tutti di me ("everyone was laughing at me"). The preposition di is mandatory; ridere takes no direct object in this sense.

Imperfetto

Fully regular on the ride- stem. The imperfect is the natural tense for past habitual or ongoing laughter, especially in childhood narratives and atmospheric writing: ridevamo di tutto ("we used to laugh at everything"), l'aula intera rideva ("the whole classroom was laughing"). It pairs beautifully with the passato prossimo for the typical narrative interruption: ridevamo quando è arrivato il professore ("we were laughing when the teacher arrived").

Passato remoto

The passato remoto is a -si pattern strong perfect, with the doubled-d of the present stem dropping out and an -s- taking its place: risi, rise, risero. This is the same pattern that produces prendere → presi/prese/presero, scendere → scesi/scese/scesero, mettere → misi/mise/misero. The 1-3-3 pattern means 2sg, 1pl, and 2pl revert to the regular ride- stem (ridesti, ridemmo, rideste) with standard endings.

This is one of the most stable and predictable irregularities in Italian: any -ere verb whose stem ends in -d- is likely to drop the -d- in 1sg, 3sg, 3pl of the passato remoto and use -si, -se, -sero with a stem-vowel shift. Ridere → risi, prendere → presi, scendere → scesi, chiedere → chiesi.

In modern usage, the passato remoto of ridere appears in narrative writing and literary registers: risero a crepapelle ("they laughed themselves silly"), ne risi per giorni ("I laughed about it for days"). In central and southern Italian speech it remains common in everyday talk; northern speakers swap to passato prossimo.

Futuro semplice

Regular future on the rider- stem — no contraction, despite what some learners expect from the analogy with vedere → vedrò. The rid- stem is too short and the resulting cluster ridr- would be unpronounceable, so the full -erò ending attaches to the -ride- stem. Compare: ridere → riderò (no contraction) vs vedere → vedrò (contraction). The difference is purely phonotactic.

The future of ridere powers a particular kind of triumph: riderà bene chi riderà ultimo ("he who laughs last laughs best"), the proverbial vindication of patience. Vedrai, ne rideremo ("you'll see, we'll laugh about it") is the standard reassurance about a current crisis.

Condizionale presente

Regular conditional. Note the double m in rideremmo — distinguishing the conditional 1pl from the future rideremo (single m). The conditional appears constantly in tentative or counterfactual laughter: riderei se non fosse così triste ("I'd laugh if it weren't so sad"), non rideresti se sapessi la verità ("you wouldn't laugh if you knew the truth").

Congiuntivo presente

Fully regular subjunctive on the rid- stem. The three singular forms collapse into rida, used after the standard subjunctive triggers: non voglio che tu rida di me ("I don't want you to laugh at me"), spero che ridano ("I hope they laugh"). One small note: the formal Lei imperative is identical to the singular subjunctive (rida), as for all Italian verbs.

Congiuntivo imperfetto

Regular on the ride- stem. Common in past hypotheticals: se ridesse di più, sarebbe più simpatica ("if she laughed more, she'd be more likeable"). Also in reported expectations about humour: pensavo che ridessero di me, invece no ("I thought they were laughing at me, but no").

Imperativo

The 2sg ridi! ("laugh!") is genuinely used as an exhortation, especially in encouragement ("come on, laugh, it's funny!") and in defiant or sarcastic rebukes ("go ahead, laugh!"). The negative non ridere! ("don't laugh!") is heard whenever a serious moment is at risk of turning comic. Note that the negative tu imperative uses the infinitive — non ridere, never non ridi.

Forme non finite

The participle riso is the wholly irregular shape — neither riduto (the regular -uto form, which does not exist) nor risuto, just riso. It belongs to the -so family of strong participles (compare preso, sceso, messo, chiuso). A small homophone trap: il riso also means "laughter" (a noun derived from the same participle) and "rice" (an entirely separate word from Greek). Context disambiguates without any difficulty.

The gerund ridendo is fully regular and very common: ne parliamo ridendo ("we talk about it laughing"), ridendo e scherzando ("between laughs and jokes" — a fixed phrase used like English "before you know it").

Compound tenses with avere

The auxiliary is always avere, and the participle riso does not agree with the subject (since this is the standard avere pattern). The participle agrees only with a preceding direct-object pronoun, which is rare with ridere because the verb takes di + object rather than a direct object.

Idioms — the laughter family

The idiomatic life of ridere is rich, and the most common formulas need to be in every learner's active vocabulary:

• far ridere — to be funny, to make laugh (the universal way to say "funny")
• morire dal ridere — to die laughing (used hyperbolically all the time)
• non c'è niente da ridere — there's nothing to laugh about (rebuke)
• ridere a crepapelle — to laugh one's head off (literally "to crack one's skin")
• ridere sotto i baffi — to laugh up one's sleeve (literally "under one's moustache")
• ridere alle spalle di qualcuno — to laugh behind someone's back
• scoppiare a ridere — to burst out laughing
• trattenere il riso — to hold back laughter
• per ridere — for fun, jokingly (l'ho detto per ridere — "I said it as a joke")
• chi ride ultimo ride meglio — he who laughs last laughs best
• una risata vi seppellirà — a laugh will bury you (a famous anarchist slogan)

The pronominal ridersela is special. It combines the verb with a reflexive se and a partitive la (referring to the whole situation), and means roughly "to laugh it off" or "to mock the situation": me la rido alle loro minacce ("I laugh off their threats"). Conjugation: me la rido, te la ridi, se la ride, ce la ridiamo, ve la ridete, se la ridono.

Etymology and derivatives

Ridere descends directly from Latin rīdēre ("to laugh"), the source of English ridicule, deride, derisive, ridiculous. The semantic field of "laughing at" — with all its mockery overtones — is preserved across the Romance languages and into English borrowings. Italian itself preserves the full family:

• il riso (n.) — laughter (also "rice," unrelated)
• la risata — a (single) laugh, a burst of laughter
• risibile — laughable, ridiculous
• deridere — to deride, mock
• derisione — derision, mockery
• sorridere — to smile (literally "to under-laugh")
• sorriso — a smile (the participle of sorridere)
• arridere — (literary) to smile upon, to favour (la fortuna le arrise — "fortune smiled on her")
• irridere — to ridicule (more formal than deridere)

Sorridere ("to smile") deserves explicit mention: it is conjugated identically to ridere (sorrido, sorridi, sorride, sorridiamo, sorridete, sorridono; passato remoto sorrisi, sorrise, sorrisero; participle sorriso). The prefix sor- comes from Latin sub- ("under, slightly"), giving the original sense of "to laugh slightly" — an etymology preserved in the gentleness of the word.

The noun risata is the most useful derivative. Una risata enorme ("a huge laugh"), una risata di gusto ("a hearty laugh"), una risata amara ("a bitter laugh") — every kind of laugh has a noun in Italian.

Common mistakes

Key takeaways

1. The auxiliary is avere — ho riso, abbiamo riso, avranno riso. The participle does not agree with the subject.

2. The participle is riso (irregular, no -uto form). It belongs to the -so family alongside preso, sceso, messo.

3. The passato remoto is risi/rise/risero — the -si pattern. The 2sg, 1pl, 2pl revert to ride-.

4. Ridere takes "di": ridere di qualcuno ("to laugh at someone"), ridere di qualcosa ("to laugh at something"). Never use a direct object for the thing laughed at.

5. Far ridere is the everyday formula for "to be funny." Drill it as a fixed unit, along with morire dal ridere ("to die laughing") and scoppiare a ridere ("to burst out laughing").

6. Sorridere ("to smile") follows the identical paradigm — learn one, get the other free.

For the parallel patterns in irregular -ere verbs with -si passato remoto, see prendere and scendere.