NYT Connections is a word-grouping puzzle: sort 16 words into four groups of four, with each group linked by a shared connection. You can play through the official NYT Games service; the New York Times Help Center also lists several other web and app access routes.
How to play Connections
- Look over all 16 words. The board contains four groups of four, but the words appear together before you know which belong in each category.
- Find four words with a shared connection. The link may depend on a shared meaning or another relationship among the words. Consider alternate meanings and overlapping patterns before choosing, since a plausible connection may not be the intended one.
- Select and submit a group. When you correctly identify a set of four, the game reveals its category name and color.
- Continue until all four groups are solved. The aim is to sort the full set of 16 words into its four connected groups.
Connections is not a crossword: you are identifying relationships among the displayed words rather than filling answers into a grid.
What do the Connections colors mean?
The game uses four colors to mark the categories’ relative difficulty. The New York Times Help Center identifies yellow as easiest and purple as trickiest; the colors are not separate game modes.
| Color | Relative difficulty |
|---|---|
| Yellow | Easiest |
| Green | Difficulty rank not specified by the NYT Help Center |
| Blue | Difficulty rank not specified by the NYT Help Center |
| Purple | Trickiest |
A secondary guide describes green as easy and blue as tougher, but the official help page does not assign those middle colors a precise rank. Treat the colors as relative clues, not a guarantee about how difficult any particular group will feel.
#1 Best Overall
Where can I play Connections?
The NYT Help Center lists Connections on NYTimes.com Games, NYTimes.com/The Athletic, The Athletic app, and the NYT News app. It says the same rules apply to both versions of Connections. Availability and access requirements may vary by service or platform; check the official NYT Games service for current details rather than assuming every route has the same subscription terms.
Use the official game if you want NYT Connections specifically. Other games may use a similar word-grouping idea, but are not necessarily the New York Times puzzle.
Quick Recap
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A useful way to approach the board
- Scan for more than one possible relationship before submitting a set; a word can appear to fit several patterns.
- Check whether a connection relies on a word’s less obvious meaning, not only its most familiar one.
- Use a revealed category as information about the remaining board, since removing a solved group narrows the words still to sort.
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