Find the links between the words to win today’s game of Connections.
getty
Each day’s game of NYT Connections goes live at midnight local time. Before today’s NYT Connections hints, here’s what you missed on Tuesday:
ForbesNYT Connections Hints Today: Tuesday, December 16 Clues And Answers (#919)By Kris HoltForbesNYT Connections: Today’s Answers Explained (Tuesday, December 16, #919)By Kris Holt
It’s Wednesday, and you know what that means: it’s time for another game of Connections!
I’m pretty well tapped out of WWE at the minute for a number of reasons. And yet, while it was announced some time ago, John Cena’s retirement this past weekend was a sad one. He is such a huge star in the pro wrestling world. More importantly than that, he is an positive inspiration for countless kids and families.
His mantra of “never give up” resonated widely and he holds the world record for granting the most wishes through the Make-A-Wish foundation. The other professional achievements he has pale in significance to that. To be a source of strength and light for so many kids and families who are going through hell must take incredible fortitude. He’ll always have my admiration for that. I hope he continues that work as he steps away from the ring to focus on his acting career.
Before we start, I want to mention the great community we have on Discord, where we chat about Connections, the rest of the NYT games and all kinds of other stuff. It’s a lovely, welcoming group of folks. I like to call it our cozy little corner of the internet. You’re more than welcome to join us. Don’t be shy!
Play Puzzles & Games on Forbes
Today’s NYT Connections hints and answers for Wednesday, December 17 are coming right up. Let’s get rolling!
NYT Connections – How To Play
Connections is a free New York Times daily word game that you can play on the NYT’s website or Games app. If you have an NYT All Access or Games subscription, you can access the Connections archive, which includes every previous game.
Connections presents you with a grid of 16 words (sometimes phrases, symbols or numbers). The aim is to arrange them into four groups of four. You don’t know how they hit together or what the category for each group is: that’s what you have to figure out.
There’s only one correct solution and there are often red herrings. You can guess incorrectly three times. A fourth wrong guess, and it’s game over.
Each group is color coded. The yellow group is usually the easiest to deduce, followed by blue, green and purple. Often, the yellow and green groups have synonyms, the blues have cultural references and the purples have some kind of wordplay involved. But this is not a hard and fast rule. Be ready for curveballs – part of the fun of Connections is in how the NYT shakes things up to keep you on your toes.
As with Wordle and similar games, it’s easy to share results with your friends using an emoji-based grid. The game tracks your progress too.
Many players take pride in having long win streaks or getting a reverse rainbow – correctly guessing the purple, blue, green and yellow groups in that order with no mistakes. That adds an extra little challenge.
NYT Connections Hints – Today’s Word List
Scroll slowly! I’ll first give you a list of today’s words, then a hint for each category. After that, I’ll reveal one word that goes into each group. Then I’ll tell you the category names, followed by the full answers.
Today’s 16 words are…
KAYAKPILOTPLANESHELLEVENMADAMTRUTHCIVICLEVELFLUKEODYSSEYDUGOUTLABELRAFTFLATACCORDNYT Connections Hints
And the hints for today’s Connections groups are:
🟨 Yellow group — an intense row isn’t necessarily a bad thing in these🟩 Green group — like a landscape with no hills or valleys🟦 Blue group — they’re big in Japan, and on the roads of many other territories🟪 Purple group — characters in the world’s best-selling book after they’ve grown upNYT Connections Hints – One Answer Per Group
Need some extra help?
Be warned: we’re starting to get into spoiler territory.
Let’s take a look at one answer for each group.
Here we go…
🟨 Yellow group — RAFT🟩 Green group — PLANE🟦 Blue group — ACCORD🟪 Purple group — TRUTHNYT Connections Hints – Groups/Categories
Today’s Connections groups are…
🟨 Yellow group — human-powered watercraft🟩 Green group — flush 🟦 Blue group — Honda models🟪 Purple group — biblical figures plus starting letter NYT Connections Answers
Spoiler alert! Don’t scroll any further down the page until you’re ready to find out today’s Connections answers.
This is your last chance to look away.
This is your final warning!
Today’s Connections answers are…
🟨 Yellow group — human-powered watercraft (DUGOUT, KAYAK, RAFT, SHELL)🟩 Green group — flush (EVEN, FLAT, LEVEL, PLANE)🟦 Blue group — Honda models (ACCORD, CIVIC, ODYSSEY, PILOT)🟪 Purple group — biblical figures plus starting letter (FLUKE, LABEL, MADAM, TRUTH)
I clocked right away that there were a bunch of palindromes: KAYAK, MADAM, CIVIC and LEVEL. I had to chance my luck with those, but no! Not even close to a group. The trap ensnared me fair and square.
KAYAK and RAFT led me toward the yellows. But I was thinking of those more of things with hollowed-out centers. I’d never heard of a DUGOUT or SHELL as watercraft until now. A DUGOUT is a hollowed-out tree, while a SHELL is a narrow watercraft that you’ll often see in Olympic rowing events.
The greens became clear after EVEN and FLAT landed next to each other. From there, the Honda ACCORD and CIVIC jumped out at me. I’m not a car guy (even though I write about them from time to time). I had to look up ODYSSEY and PILOT to make sure they were the missing two.
The purples were completely beyond me today. I had not known that Ruth was a biblical figure, and the others didn’t click for me at all. Those refer to:
FLUKE > LukeLABEL > AbelMADAM > AdamTRUTH > Ruth
In any case, I’m glad to keep this run going with my 291st victory in a row.
How did you get on today? Here’s my grid:
🟨🟪🟦🟩
🟨🟨🟨🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟦🟦🟦🟦
🟪🟪🟪🟪
I’m a little annoyed, because I was preparing things in advance for once and I definitely wrote up a separate Answers Explained column, but it didn’t save. Nor did my Quordle column for today, so I had to do that again. 🫠
Alas, I’m bummed that I don’t have time to re-do today’s dedicated Answers Explained now. (I will note, though, that Honda’s spokesperson is John Cena. I hadn’t played today’s game before I wrote the intro to this column, so that was a fun coincidence.)
That’s all there is to it for today’s Connections clues and answers. Be sure to check my blog tomorrow for hints and the solution for Thursday’s game if you need them.
P.S. We had a group of “enormous” words on Monday that included synonyms for terms that describe something very large. That made me think of a movie that I was reminded of recently, Colossal, which was written and directed by Nacho Vigalondo.
The film stars Anne Hathaway as Gloria, a woman who moves back to her hometown after a break up. She learns that when she walks through a local playground, she can manifest a kaiju that appears in Seoul. It’s a wild concept and it’s executed smartly. Colossal is not entirely a lighthearted comedy, as it deals with alcoholism and other issues, but it’s confident, strange and entertaining on the whole:
Have a great day! Stay hydrated! Be kind to yourself and each other! Call someone you love!
Please follow my blog for more NYT Connections hints and help with other word games, and even some video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me out a lot! Sharing this column with other people who play Connections would be appreciated too. You can also read my weekend editions of this column at my newsletter, Pastimes.