June will mark one year since The New York Times unveiled Connections, the news outlet's latest word game that quickly became an online sensation.
Connections, which is the Times' second-most played game after Wordle, challenges players to uncover threads connecting a series of words.
Should this be your first time giving it a try, Newsweek has provided some instructions below. Clues and the answers are toward the end of the article.
How To Play 'Connections'
In Connections players must group together words they think have common threads to reveal the name of their corresponding categories.
Each puzzle consists of 16 words, with each group of words separated into four categories. The uniting themes can come from a broad range of categories, including anything from horror movie franchises to types of sound to food.
If all four words are correctly placed into each set, those words will be removed from the board. Each incorrect guess counts toward the mistake tally. Players can make up to four mistakes before the game ends.
Players can shuffle and rearrange the board if they want to try to make the process of guessing the connections easier.
The board also has a color-coding system representing levels of difficulty. Yellow represents the easiest, followed by green, blue and purple. A group's color will only be revealed once the words in a group have been correctly connected.
It's worth pointing out that a word can sometimes belong to more than one category—but there is only one correct answer.
Connections editor Wyna Liu, who is credited with bringing the game to life, has advised that if you notice that there are five or more words that belong to one category, try pivoting to a different category before making your first guess.
"Doing so might take one of those extra cards out of contention, or at least remove a few cards from the board, making other categories easier to see," Liu said.
The answers for today's Connections puzzle will be revealed at the end of this article, so please scroll with caution if you want to work them out yourself.
'Connections' #333 Clues for Thursday, May 9
Newsweek has some hints to help you figure out today's Connections categories.
Yellow: These words keep container contents contained.
Green: For these words, think of anything from minutes to months.
Blue: These words could represent the setting of boundaries.
Purple: Each of these answers describe attributes of a unique mammal.
'Connections' #333 Answers for Thursday, May 9
Yellow Category: CONTAINER CLOSURES
Yellow Words: Cap, Cork, Lid, Tab
Green Category: DURATION
Green Words: Period, Spell, Stretch, Time
Blue Category: REGULATE
Blue Words: Check, Contain, Curb, Limit
Purple Category: TRADEMARKS OF A PLATYPUS
Purple Words: Bill, Egg, Fur, Venom
Did you guess the answers correctly? If so, congratulations. If not, there will be another opportunity to crack the puzzle tomorrow.
Connections is released at midnight in your local time zone. Newsweek will be back with another round of hints and tips for each new game.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Ryan Smith is a Newsweek Senior Pop Culture and Entertainment Reporter based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on ... Read more
