What’s new, Argentina? When you promenade through the nation’s capital city of Buenos Aires, you’ll not only experience a vibrant cultural center, but a welcoming way of life. Show your respect to the men’s World Cup champions in fútbol (soccer), take in the tango scene at a world-famous milonga (a musical style, a dance, and an event!), and experience all life has to offer both day and night.
Across the border in Uruguay, you can soak in the culture of the Río de la Plata, the world’s widest river, at your own pace. Follow it through old colonial cities to sip mate in a café or visit the cobblestone streets of the UNESCO World Heritage site Colonia del Sacramento.
Whether you stay fueled by empanadas and asado (barbecued meat), or milanesa (breaded chicken) and muzza (short for a pizza with mozzarella), the modern, creative energy of the Rioplatense region is sure to call to both the traveler and the digital nomad, inviting you to experience two of the world’s most interesting capital cities and beyond.
Will your Spanish open the door to this spectacular region? The Rioplatense Spanish dialect is similar enough to Standard Latin American Spanish to be mutually understood, but has some intriguing features that will help you fall deeper in love with your new language. Rosetta Stone can help you on your way to chatting with the locals with confidence. Our Dynamic Immersion method has you learning through context and reasoning rather than rote memorization, speaking in the very first second of your first lesson to launch your next adventure!
Where is Rioplatense Spanish spoken?
The Río de la Plata, also called the La Plata River or the River Plate (even though plata means “silver”) is often called the widest river in the world. It is a major estuary formed where the Uruguay River and the Paraná River flow together and empty into the Atlantic Ocean. A distinct way of speaking developed through the most populated cities in the region, including Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, Rosario, Santa Fe, La Plata, Mar del Plata, and Bahía Blanca. Rioplatense Spanish is also the dominant dialect of all of Uruguay.
You may experience Rioplatense Spanish in culturally influenced areas, such as parts of Paraguay, Patagonia, and Córdoba. As it is the standard dialect used in media in Argentina and Uruguay, you may also connect with Rioplatense Spanish on television, social media platforms, or online communities.
Why is Spanish spoken in this region?
As in all of South and Central America, the Spanish brought their language to the area during the period of Spanish colonization of the region during the 16th century. While they spread their influence and language throughout the Rioplatense region, the dialect spoken here today was more heavily influenced by a wave of relatively recent immigration from Italy and Spain, which began in the 1870s.
Spanish is Argentina’s primary language, spoken by around 90 percent of its population. Most of the Spanish spoken in Uruguay mirrors the dialect spoken in Buenos Aires, as roughly 70 percent of the population of the country lives in its capital, Montevideo.
In both Argentina and Uruguay, much of today’s population can trace their roots back to Italy. The second most-spoken language in this area would be no surprise, as many families have continued to speak Italian, and connections with Italian family and visitors are still strong today. It is logical that Argentine Spanish is often seen as having typically Italian characteristics.
Levantine Arabic lands in third place for number of speakers in Argentina. English is required in schools, and the country ranks high in English aptitude. Guarani and Quechua are two of fifteen surviving Indigenous American languages of Argentina. It is not uncommon to hear any of the languages of the world spoken in these two popular capital cities, as today’s remote workers and “digital nomads” have found a welcoming home near the Río de la Plata.
Uruguay’s border with Brazil and historical connections to Portugal has created a spectrum of language near the border that sometimes makes it unclear where Portuguese ends and Spanish begins. Uruguayan Sign Language was also given official language status in 2001.
How many people speak Rioplatense Spanish?
Because Rioplatense Spanish is a dialect and not its own language, it is difficult to say how many speakers of the language exist today. Some estimates indicate that roughly 70% of the population of Argentina, and nearly all of the Spanish speakers in Uruguay would fall into this category.
While both countries have welcomed immigrants from around the world, there are also people of Argentine and Uruguayan descent living in the United States, Brazil, Canada, Australia, and multiple countries in Europe who speak this particular dialect of Spanish.
What does a Rioplatense Spanish accent sound like?
Most people can’t perceive their own accent, but almost everyone’s speech is affected by where they grew up. English speakers from around the world all seem to have vastly different pronunciation and tone, but can understand each other. Like any dialect, it is inaccurate to speak of one particular Rioplatense accent without falling into the trap of stereotyping. In addition to Rioplatense, Argentine Spanish includes:
- Cuyano
- Cordobés
- Andean, and
- Chaqueño
Areas that are closer to other languages and dialects will show their accent reflected in the local speech. Additionally, generation, gender, socio-economic factors, and current trends can influence someone’s accent.
While a new learner of Spanish might not quickly differentiate between different varieties of Caribbean or other Latin American varieties of Spanish, it is fairly easy, even for a beginner, to identify Rioplatense Spanish due to some distinctive characteristics!
Sheísmo
The feature that may stand out the most to a learner’s ear is the sounds of the ll and y, pronounced a bit softer than the sh in the English word “shine.” Called yeísmo rehilado, or sheísmo, this characteristic originated around Buenos Aires and expanded to the rest of the area. Next time you get the opportunity to listen to Rioplatense Spanish, pay attention to words such as:
- calle
- me llamo
- playa
- botella
- lluvia
- yo
Intonation
Native speakers of other Spanish dialects, when asked about Rioplatense Spanish, might point out the apparent influence of the languages of Italy on the intonation and general flow of Spanish in Argentina and Uruguay. Often called a “sing-song” quality, you’ll notice an up-and-down change in intonation mid-sentence, mid-phrase, and mid-word, emphasizing and elongating syllables where it would be uncommon in other dialects of Spanish.
Other features
While these are common to other Spanish dialects, some characteristics of some Rioplatense speakers are:
- the pronunciation of ge, gi, j is not glottalized
- dropping the final r of an infinitive and final s of most words
- ñ sounding more drawn out as two sounds, as though spelled ni
- dropping or aspirating the s if it precedes another consonant, such as in the words esto (sounds like ehto), but pronouncing it before vowel sounds
- unlike in spain, not hearing a difference between c/z and s
Is it difficult to learn Rioplatense Spanish?
Learning any language takes a lot of time, practice, and patience. Even native Spanish speakers may need to pay a bit of extra attention when talking to their Rioplatense neighbors, and vocabulary differences can be a source of amusement! For a learner, the rule-breaking of casual speech and a new accent can be difficult, but these challenges just mean you’ll never be bored!
If you are a beginner or intermediate learner, you’ll need to find a sympathetic interlocutor, which means a person who is willing to help you communicate by:
- working to understand your meaning
- communicating clearly using Spanish that is easier for you to understand
- slowing down
- enunciating well
- avoiding too much slang
- shifting their vocabulary to a more universally understood word
- using gestures or other non-verbal communication to explain meanings
You can always ask for clarification, examples, or further explanations when you don’t understand, or make note of language differences to look up later. The same conversations are common even among native speakers!
Other good ideas would be to use videos online and on social media. Use subtitles and playback tools to rewatch, slow down, and take advantage of hashtags and creators from Argentina and Uruguay. With enough exposure, you’ll gain confidence and proficiency in this dynamic dialect.
What are the differences between Rioplatense Spanish and Latin American Spanish?
Voseo
In Spanish courses, a foundation of grammar study is the typical list of subject pronouns. You might or might not have been taught vosotros as a second-person informal plural that is only used in Spain, but very few materials include vos, which is an equivalent of tú, or its accompanying conjugations.
Voseo, the use of vos in place of tú, is not only common, but considered standard in Rioplatense Spanish. While you may hear vos in Costa Rica and other parts of some Latin American countries, it is far more common in Argentina and Uruguay.
So what is vos? Centuries ago, it was used as a respectful term, similar to the use of “thou” in English, but today it is used as an informal singular pronoun, especially for friends, family members, and people you know well, but also might extend to others depending on the casual nature of the situation or conversation.
Vos has its own conjugations as well.
Regular verbs in the vos form are conjugated by following these steps:
- drop the final r from the infinitive
- replace it with s
- add an accent and stress the final vowel
- do not change the stem, even for verbs like querer and perder which usually include a spelling change in the stem.
| Rioplatense Spanish | Latin American Spanish | Meaning |
| vos hablás | tú hablas | you speak |
| vos perdés | tú pierdes | you lose |
| vos querés | tú quieres | you want |
| vos vivís | tú vives | you live |
| vos decís | tú dices | you say |
The verb ser is irregular as usual, but also very common, so it’s worth learning these phrases on their own:
| Rioplatense Spanish | Latin American Spanish | Meaning |
| ¿De dónde sos? | ¿De dónde eres? | Where are you from? |
| vos sos | tú eres | you are |
To form the affirmative imperative, use the usted form, but stress the final vowel. The single syllable command forms will add a stressed vowel. The verb ir (to go) is replaced by the verb andar (to walk) in the imperative.
| Rioplatense Spanish | Latin American Spanish | Meaning |
| hablá | habla | speak |
| comé | come | eat |
| vení | ven | come |
| hacé | haz | do/make |
| andá | ve | go |
Intonation and speed
The intonation of the speech of Rioplatense Spanish is often compared to Italian, but it is more accurate to specify the languages of southern Italy that have had the most influence, including Lombard and Napolitano. Phrases and sentences tend to have a bouncy quality.
Some might say that the Spanish spoken in Argentina and Uruguay is a faster dialect, but this could also be a perception because of the other language differences. Spanish in general is a language that is spoken very quickly. Don’t be afraid to ask someone to slow down and enunciate more clearly in order to help your comprehension.
Tense differences
In Rioplatense Spanish, it is uncommon to use the simple future tense, such as hablaré, comeremos, vivirán (I will speak, We will eat, They will live). Instead, the structure ir + a + (infinitive) is used to express any future ideas.
- voy a hablar
- vamos a comer
- van a vivir
As in most Latin American Spanish dialects, the present perfect (to have done something) is all but replaced with the simple past, or pretérito (preterite).
Instead of ellos no han empezado (they have not begun) you would more likely hear ellos no empezaron todavía (they didn’t start yet).
Influence of other languages.
Rioplatense Spanish has borrowed vocabulary from Quechua, Guaraní, and Mapuche languages.
| Rioplatense Spanish | meaning |
| el choclo | corn |
| el pochoclo, el pororó | popcorn |
| el tambo | dairy farm |
| el yuyo | a weed or intrusive plant |
| una laucha | a type of rodent |
| un chabón | a dude, guy |
“Reverse” slang
Learners of French might be familiar with the “verlan,” a playful slang popular among youth, where syllables of common words are switched around. Rioplatense Spanish shares this feature in a slang form called vesre. If you look closely at that word, you’ll see it is formed by switching the syllables of revés (reverse). In some cases, the vesre word is used more often than the standard vocabulary.
| Vesre | Standard Spanish | meaning |
| lorca | calor | heat |
| feca | café | coffee |
| jermu | mujer | woman |
| arafue | afuera | outside |
| atroden | adentro | inside |
| sopermi | permiso | Excuse me |
| lleca | calle | street |
Must-know Rioplatense Spanish words and phrases
Spanish in Argentina and Uruguay is known for vocabulary that stands out among the other dialects of Standard Spanish. This is due to the influence of other languages, particularly languages of Southern Italy, use of slang, and localisms.
When using unfamiliar vocabulary, especially slang, context is key, as some slang words have multiple layers of meaning. It is a good idea to observe the situations in which they are used and limit your use of new expressions with trusted individuals, to avoid misunderstanding! Don’t be afraid to ask questions.
| Rioplatense Spanish | Meaning |
|---|---|
| ¡Buen día! | hello, good morning! |
| che | hey, used to get attention/show surprise or amazement. |
| ¿Qué hacés che? | how are you? (literally – what are you doing?) |
| acá andamos | things are going ok (but not great) |
| afanar | to rob, to mug |
| alto/alta | really good |
| chau | bye, goodbye |
| dale | ok (where you might hear vale in peninsular spanish) |
| el baúl | the trunk of a car |
| el bondi | the bus |
| el chamuyo/el chamullo | use of sweet talk or “fast talk” in order to convince someone of something untrue. |
| el laburo | work (from the italian word “lavoro”) |
| el mango | money (often used in the context where you don’t have any money) |
| el subte | the subway/metro/underground |
| el tacho | the taxi |
| flashero | trippy, crazy |
| la facha | the face, appearance |
| la guita | money |
| la plata | money |
| la posta | the pure truth |
| las medias | socks |
| mal | can mean good as well as bad! (think about how the word “wicked” can be used in some english slang as an intensifier). |
| morfar, manyar | to eat |
| ni a palos | not a chance |
| parlar | to talk |
| un ananá | a pineapple |
| un capo | a capable person |
| un embole | something really boring |
| un pancho | a hot dog |
| un pibe/una piba | boy, girl |
| un toque | a little bit (un poco) |
| una birra | a beer (italian) |
| una frutilla | a strawberry |
| una heladera | a refrigerator |
| una pajita | a drinking straw |
| una palta | an avocado |
| una pileta | a swimming pool |
| una remera | a t-shirt |
Explore Spanish in every region with Rosetta Stone
At this point you’re surely ready to experience everything that the Río de la Plata region has to offer, whether you’re drawn to the hustle and bustle of a large city, the influence of Italian culture on the language, culture, and food, or the slower pace of the surrounding areas. You’re sure to find the experience of a lifetime in Argentina and Uruguay.
With 20 countries officially recognizing Spanish as an official language, close to 500 million native Spanish speakers, Spanish being the 4th most spoken language in the world and also the second most-used language on the internet, you will never be done learning Spanish! Learning the basics and more universal vocabulary words can open the keys to an array of language communities, but no matter where you choose to travel, study, or do business, there will be regional specifics to keep you motivated!
Rosetta Stone can help you by focusing your language learning journey on what matters most. As a Rosetta Stone learner, you’ll capitalize on early successes to boost your confidence fast. Our Dynamic Immersion method provides maximum exposure to a new language, through audio spoken by native speakers, written words, and real-world images. Everything is presented in the new language, providing a truly immersive experience. Say ¿Qué hacés che? to your new language and get started today!
