Connections
A practice puzzle. Play as many as you like: they never count toward your streak.
Mistakes remaining
in_progress
How to play Connections
- 1 Find four groups of four words that share something in common, using the 16 words on the board.
- 2 Tap four words to select them, then tap Submit. Tap a selected word again to unselect it, use Deselect all to start over, or Shuffle to see the words in a new order.
- 3 A correct guess locks the group in place in its difficulty color, from yellow (most straightforward) to purple (trickiest).
- 4 A wrong guess costs one of your four mistakes. "One away" means three of your four words belong to the same group.
- 5 Find all four groups before your fourth mistake to solve the puzzle. A new puzzle arrives every day at midnight UTC.
Pets
Dog, hamster, parrot, rabbit
Shades of blue
Navy, teal, cobalt, royal
Planets
Mars, Venus, Earth, Saturn
___fish
Star, sword, gold, cat
Cat looks like a pet, but it completes catfish. Expect red herrings like this.
Frequently asked questions
Four. Every wrong guess uses one, including a guess that is "One away", which means three of your four words belong to the same group. The fourth mistake ends the puzzle and reveals the groups you missed.
Each group has a difficulty color: yellow is the most straightforward, then green, blue and purple, the trickiest, which often hinges on wordplay. You can solve the groups in any order.
It can look that way, and those red herrings are part of the challenge. Each word belongs to exactly one group, so solving the group you are surest of first narrows down the rest.
A new puzzle goes live every day at midnight UTC, and everyone gets the same 16 words. Your progress on today's puzzle is saved, so you can leave and come back to it.
There is one daily puzzle. For more, press Practice to play as many extra puzzles as you like, picked at random from our collection, so now and then you may meet one you have seen before. Practice puzzles are never today's puzzle and do not count toward your streak or stats.
Your streak counts the days in a row you solve the puzzle by finding all four groups. Running out of mistakes resets it to zero, and skipping a day means your next win starts a new streak.
No. Connections is free with no sign-up, and your progress and streak are saved in this browser. Log in or create an account to keep them on your account and play on any device; progress from this browser moves over when you log in.
Yes. When the puzzle ends, tap Share to copy an emoji grid of your guesses, one colored square per word, so friends can see how you did without seeing the answers.
No. This is an independent, free word-grouping game inspired by the New York Times puzzle, with its own daily puzzles. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by The New York Times.