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Ils ouvrent le champagne avec les invités.

Ils ouvrent le champagne avec les invités.
They are opening the champagne with the guests.
From Lesson 90:Irregular -ir verbs with regular endings (ouvrir, offrir)·French

Questions & Answers about Ils ouvrent le champagne avec les invités.

Since ouvrir ends in -ir, shouldn't the 'they' form have an -issent ending like finir?
Normally, yes! But ouvrir (to open) is a rule-breaker. Even though it has an -ir infinitive, it borrows all of its present tense endings from the -er verb family. To make the 'they' form, you just drop the -ir and add the standard -er ending (-ent), giving us ils ouvrent.
Do I pronounce the -ent at the end of ouvrent?
No, you don't. A common trap for learners is trying to say the end of this word, but the -ent ending for verbs in the 'they' form is completely silent. You pronounce ouvrent exactly like you would pronounce ouvre (the 'he/she' form). It sounds like 'oovr'.
The word invités looks a lot like the English word 'invited'. Are they related?
Yes, exactly! Un invité literally translates to 'an invited (person)'. French often takes the past tense form of a verb—in this case, inviter (to invite)—and uses it directly as a noun to describe the person who received the action.
Do I need to connect the words les and invités when speaking?
Yes, you need to make a liaison here. Because invités starts with a vowel, the usually silent s at the end of les wakes up and is pronounced like a 'z'. You say it all together as 'lay-zin-vee-tay'.

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