Looking for Thursday’s Strands hints, spangram and answers? You can find them here:
It’s Friday at least, dearest Strandistians. We’ve made it to the end of the week, and this will be my last Strands guide for a couple weeks as I pass the baton to my colleague, Kris Holt who will then pass it to my colleague, Paul Tassi, before it comes spinning back my way. It’s been a fun week of Strands and I’ll keep doing the puzzles over the next couple of weeks even if I’m not writing guides for them. I will be writing my daily Wordle guide, however, so stay tuned for that.
We’re over halfway through April and spring is in full swing. It’s practically summer weather here in the mountains which means that on top of puzzles, it’s time to get out and hike and swim and get that fresh spring air. I hope you all have a lovely weekend! Let’s do this Strands!
How To Play Strands
The New York Times’ Strands puzzle is a play on the classic word search. It’s in beta for now, which means it’ll only stick around if enough people play it every day.
There’s a new game of Strands to play every day. The game will present you with a six by eight grid of letters. The aim is to find a group of words that have something in common, and you’ll get a clue as to what that theme is. When you find a theme word, it will remain highlighted in blue.
You’ll also need to find a special word called a spangram. This tells you what the words have in common. The spangram links two opposite sides of the board. While the theme words will not be a proper name, the spangram can be a proper name. When you find the spangram, it will remain highlighted in yellow.
Strands still isn’t on the New York Times games app, but you can play it right here.
What Is Today’s Strands Hint?
Scroll slowly! Just after the hint for today’s Strands puzzle, I’ll reveal what the answer words are.
The official theme hint for today’s Strand puzzle is: Get to work!
Here’s an extra hint to help guide you to the solution: On the dial (and for an extra hint, see my first guess on today’s Wordle, which was inspired by this Strands).
What Are Today’s Strands Answers?
Spoiler alert! Don’t scroll any further down the page until you’re ready to find out today’s Strands answers.
Today’s Spangram
I’ll first tell you the spangram and show you where that is on the grid. I’ll then tell you the other words and show you how they fit in.
This is your final warning!
Today’s Strands spangram is . . .
DRIVETIME
Here’s where the Spangram is on the grid:
All Today’s Strands Answers
Today’s Strands was a bit trickier than the last couple of days, and I admit it took me a bit to get the “theme” though once I had a few of the words it all started to click. Think of things you’d find (or hear) in the car on your way to work. What does that experience of a commute feel like?
If you need extra help, spoilers below!
Here’s the full list of words:
- Music
- Talk
- Comedy
- Traffic
- Weather
- Sports
- News
Today’s Strands Breakdown
As you can see, today’s Strands is more about what you listen to on the radio while driving to work than it is about getting to work or even the spangram, DRIVETIME. Each of these words is a different radio station or genre. MUSIC was the first word I got, followed closely by TALK. I was pretty sure after COMEDY that this was radio-related, but TRAFFIC threw me off and I started to think this was more about a commute in general. But then SPORTS and NEWS and WEATHER were the next words I got (after DRIVETIME) and it became clear that this was very radio-on-the-way-to-work specific. This was a bit trickier than yesterday’s but once the pieces started to click, not too bad. Maybe tougher for people who don’t commute in a car or listen to the radio!
How did you do on your Strands today? Let me know on Twitter and Facebook.
Be sure to check out my blog for my daily Wordle guides as well as all my other writing about TV shows, streaming guides, movie reviews, video game coverage and much more. Thanks for stopping by!
