Looking for Tuesday’s Connections hints and answers instead? You can find them here:
Hey, everyone! Happy New Year! I hope 2025 brings you everything you ever wanted. As us Scots say, lang may your lum reek (or “long may your chimney smoke,” an expression that wishes prosperity upon you).
I’ve had my fair share of New Year’s mishaps, however. About a decade ago, my partner at the time and I were in Berlin for the festivities. People there bring in the New Year by setting off fireworks in the street.
Unfortunately, one exploded near her bare leg, causing a burn. Cue a hasty retreat to our holiday rental and a call to first responders. The burn was deep but fairly small and not too serious, thankfully. Still, finding a pharmacy that was open on January 1 and getting the wound treatments we needed was a challenge, especially considering that neither of us had a particularly strong grasp of German.
Needless to say, I hope you’re being careful out there and mindful of your surroundings, however you’re celebrating the occasion.
Before we get started, I’ve started a discussion group for Connections and this column on Discord. You can chat about each game (and other topics) with me and other folks. I’m always interested to find out how other people approach the game, so join us! It’s fun.
It’s also the best way to give me any feedback about the column, especially on the rare(!) occasions that I mess something up.
Today’s NYT Connections hints and answers for Wednesday, January 1, are coming right up.
How To Play Connections
Connections is a free, popular New York Times daily word game. You get a new puzzle at midnight every day. You can play on the NYT website or Games app.
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 items you can click, names for research study participants or words preceded by a body part.
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 usually the most difficult one. The purple group often involves wordplay.
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. As with Wordle and other similar games, it’s easy to share results with your friends on social media and group chats.
If you have an NYT All Access or Games subscription, you can access the publication’s Connections archive. This includes every previous game of Connections, so you can go back and play any of those that you have missed.
Aside from the first 60 games or so, you should be able to find my hints for each grid via Google if you need them! Just click here and add the date of the game for which you need clues or the answers to the search query.
What Are Today’s Connections Hints?
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…
- EARTHWORM
- CLOG
- SLUG
- WATERFALL
- GLOWSTICK
- RAINDROP
- CANAL
- FIREFLY
- WINDMILL
- RADIUM
- SKYDIVE
- SALAMANDER
- AURORA
- EEL
- TULIP
- GATEGRASH
And the hints for today’s Connections groups are:
- Yellow group — slithery critters
- Green group — light ‘em up
- Blue group — like bicycles and Gouda
- Purple group — it all comes tumbling down at the end
What Are Today’s Connections Groups?
Need some extra help?
Be warned: we’re starting to get into spoiler territory.
Today’s Connections groups are…
- Yellow group — slimy animals
- Green group — things that luminesce
- Blue group — Dutch symbols
- Purple group — ending with synonyms for “plunge”
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 — slimy animals (EARTHWORM, EEL, SALAMANDER, SLUG)
- Green group — things that luminesce (AURORA, FIREFLY, GLOWSTICK, RADIUM)
- Blue group — Dutch symbols (CANAL, CLOG, TULIP, WINDMILL)
- Purple group — ending with synonyms for “plunge” (GATECRASH, RAINDROP, SKYDIVE, WATERFALL)
It’s been quite a few days since my last perfect game and that didn’t change today, but I’m very happy to extend my streak into double figures as the New Year gets underway. Here’s how I fared:
🟨🟪🟩🟦
🟨🟪🟪🟪
🟨🟨🟨🟨
🟪🟪🟦🟪
🟪🟪🟪🟪
🟦🟦🟦🟦
🟩🟩🟩🟩
Drat, I was so sure I had the purples with EARTHWORM, WATERFALL, FIREFLY and WINDMILL with the first half of each word being elements (shout out to my fellow Captain Planet fans). I then tried a guess of EARTHWORM, WATERFALL, RAINDROP and GATECRASH — all ending in verbs — and was one away from a group. Hmm…
At that point, I figured the slithery animals had to be a group and, sure enough, I had the yellows. I roped WINDMILL into my previous guess but that was another mistake, but given that SKYDIVE ended in a verb too I at last understood that had to go with the purples. A little sneaky to have that one in there given that the entire word is also a possible meaning of “plunge.”
With just eight words left, the blues then jumped out at me. That left the greens, for which I did realize the connection before submitting, for the win.
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. In the interest of keeping the party mood going, here’s a song from a band that hails from my hometown. “Let’s Go Round Again” might not be the best-known song from Average White Band, but it’s my favorite of theirs. I also just realized it’s thematically relevant in the sense that we’re on the start of another trip around the Sun:
Have a great day! Make sure to drink enough water! Call someone you love!
If you’re so inclined, please do follow my blog for more coverage of Connections and other word games and even some video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me out a lot! Also, follow me on Bluesky! It’s fun there.
