Looking for Friday’s Connections hints and answers? You can find them here:
Welcome to the weekend, folks! I hope you’ve got some fun things lined up. It’s going to be a milder couple of days here, weather-wise, so I might go out and about for once. On the other hand, it’s an FA Cup weekend, so I may just stay home and devour as much of that action as I can instead.
In any case, today’s NYT Connections hints and answers are coming right up.
How To Play Connections
In Connections, you’re presented with a grid of 16 words. Your task is to arrange them into four groups of four by figuring out the links between them. The groups could be things like horror movie franchises, a type of verb or rappers.
There’s only one solution for each puzzle, and you’ll need to be careful when it comes to words that might fit into more than one category. You can shuffle the words to perhaps help you see links between them.
Each group is color coded. The yellow group is usually the easiest to figure out, blue and green fall in the middle, and the purple group is typically the hardest one to deduce. The purple group often involves wordplay, so bear that in mind.
Select four words you think go together and press Submit. If you make a guess and you’re incorrect, you’ll lose a life. If you’re close to having a correct group, you might see a message telling you that you’re one word away from getting it right, but you’ll still need to figure out which one to swap.
If you make four mistakes, it’s game over. Let’s make sure that doesn’t happen with the help of some hints, and, if you’re really struggling, today’s Connections answers.
Connections Hints For January 27
Scroll slowly! Just after the hints for each of today’s Connections groups, I’ll reveal what the groups are without immediately telling you which words go into them.
Today’s 16 words are:
- HEART
- MIND
- WRIST
- WATCH
- SMART
- COURAGE
- WRONG
- ANSWER
- GUARD
- BRAIN
- STING
- HOME
- BURN
- TEND
- TWO
- ACHE
And the clues for today’s groups are:
- Yellow group — pain
- Green group — protect
- Blue group — things Dorothy and pals are seeking
- Purple group — they share a common, quiet letter
Connections Groups For January 27
Need some extra help?
Be warned: we’re starting to get into spoiler territory.
Today’s groups are…
- Yellow group — hurt
- Green group — look after
- Blue group — sought after in The Wizard of Oz
- Purple group — silent “w”
What Are Today’s 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 final warning!
Today’s Connections answers are…
- Yellow group — hurt (ACHE, BURN, SMART, STING)
- Green group — look after (GUARD, MIND, TEND, WATCH)
- Blue group — sought after in The Wizard of Oz (BRAIN, COURAGE, HEART, HOME)
- Purple group — silent “w” (ANSWER, TWO, WRIST, WRONG)
Two straight perfect games means I have a two-day winning streak.
Today was one of those games that saw me stare at the grid for a few minutes, felling utterly stumped, but once the pieces started falling into place, it was straightforward enough.
One thing I find helpful is to look for words that only really have one or two meanings or connotations and look for possible pairings. For me, that started with ACHE, which led me to getting the blues.
When the Connections grid rearranged itself, it placed COURAGE and HEART next to each other. That gave me an “aha!” moment and I was able to deduce the blues. GUARD was then my entry point into the greens. That left the purple words and I’m ashamed to say I didn’t figure out the connection before hitting the Submit button this time.
That’s all there is to it for today’s Connections clues and answers. Be sure to check my blog for hints and the solution for Sunday’s game if you need them.
