The main human character in Inside Out is Riley Andersen, usually referred to simply as Riley.
Riley is an 11-year-old girl whose mind provides the film’s central setting. The story follows her emotions—Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust—as they respond to a major change in her life. Her family moves from Minnesota to San Francisco because of her father’s new job, disrupting the memories and routines that shaped her identity.
Although the emotions receive much of the screen time, Riley is the human person whose experiences drive the plot. Her memories are represented as colored spheres, and her most important memories help form personality islands connected with areas such as family, friendship, and hockey. The film’s emotional conflict comes from Riley struggling to adapt rather than from an external villain.
A common mix-up is treating Joy as the main human character. Joy is the central emotion and a major viewpoint character, voiced by Amy Poehler, but she is not human. Riley is voiced by Kaitlyn Dias in the original film and remains the core human character of the Inside Out story.