Some of the main disadvantages of the rice parboiling process are the intensities of grain color and flavor, which may be due to the Maillard reactions during the hydrothermal stage and the stage with humid heat and pressure, these characteristics negatively affect consumer acceptability. The development of faster and more efficient rice parboiling processes, such as microwave irradiation, can improve grain quality and reduce browning reactions. This study evaluate the reduction time of rice parboiling using a microwave system and to reduce browning of the grains. The rice grains in the shell were submitted to hydrothermal stage 2:1(water:rice) in a microwave equipment (AntonPaar) at 400 W and 65 °C during 10, 20, 30 e 40 min. Then, the water was drained and the grains were again subjected to microwave irradiation at 500 W and 110 °C during 0, 5 and 10 min. Afterwards, the grains were dried at 38 ° C in air circulation oven, peeled and polished. A control treatment was prepared by the conventional parboiling process (65 °C). Percentage of totally non-gelatinized grains, color parameters and cooking time were determined. The totally non-gelatinized grains were found mainly in the treatments that were not submitted to the second stage of microwave irradiation. The microwave grains presented higher luminosity (p ≤ 0.05) than the control treatment, with the exception of the 40 min treatment in the hydrothermal stage and 10 min in the wet heat stage with pressure. Whiter grains indicate a decrease in the Maillard reaction products. The cooking time of the treatments in microwave was lower in relation to the control, which may be due to microwave irradiation. The results showed that it is a microwave irradiation and a promising technique for a parboiling of the rice as it decreases 10 min in process time.