If you’re looking for the Connections answer for Wednesday, October 1, 2025, read on—I’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solutions to all four categories. Along the way, I’ll explain the meanings of the trickier words and we’ll learn how everything fits together. Beware, there are spoilers below for October 1, NYT Connections #843! Read on if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Connections game. If you want an easy way to come back to our Connections hints every day, bookmark this page. (If you play Wordle, Strands, or Quordle, check out our hints for those games, too.) Below, I’ll give you some oblique hints at today’s Connections answers. And farther down the page, I’ll reveal the themes and the answers. Scroll slowly and take just the hints you need! Here are spoiler-free hints that describe the type of each category in today’s Connections: Yellow category - Related nouns. Green category - Synonyms. Blue category - Related nouns. Purple category - Fill in the blank. Hints for the themes in today’s Connections puzzleHere are some spoiler-free hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Yellow category - Natural aquatic phenomena. Green category - What a movie reviewer might do to a badly made film. Blue category - Can you hear me, hear me, hear me? Purple category - They go with a word for an award. BEWARE: Spoilers follow for today’s Connections puzzle!We’re about to give away some of the answers. Scroll slowly if you don’t want the whole thing spoiled. (The full solution is a bit further down.) A heads up about the tricky partsI found today’s puzzle to be particularly hard. A CATARACT is a term for a waterfall. SLAM, RAPIDS, CANYON, and JURY could all go with “grand,” but those words all belong to different categories today. BOOBY is a term for someone foolish, and it goes with a word for something given as a joke to a last-place finisher. KNOCK is a verb that fits into the phrase “don’t KNOCK it ‘til you try it,” for example. What are the categories in today’s Connections?Yellow: FAST-MOVING WATER Green: CRITICIZE Blue: ECHOEY PLACES Purple: ___ PRIZE DOUBLE BEWARE: THE SOLUTION IS BELOWReady to learn the answers to today’s Connections puzzle? I give them all away below. What are the yellow words in today’s Connections?The yellow grouping is considered to be the most straightforward. The theme for today’s yellow group is FAST-MOVING WATER and the words are: CATARACT, CURRENT, RAPIDS, WHIRLPOOL. What are the green words in today’s Connections?The green grouping is supposed to be the second-easiest. The theme for today’s green category is CRITICIZE and the words are: FLAME, KNOCK, SKEWER, SLAM. What are the blue words in today’s Connections?The blue grouping is the second-hardest. The theme for today’s blue category is ECHOEY PLACES and the words are: CANYON, HALLWAY, TUNNEL, ZOOM CALL. What are the purple words in today’s Connections?The purple grouping is considered to be the hardest. The theme for today’s purple category is ___ PRIZE and the words are: BOOBY, DOOR, FIRST, JURY. How I solved today’s ConnectionsI think RAPIDS, CURRENT, and WHIRLPOOL, could be different forms of water movement, but I’m not sure about a fourth yet. Maybe TUNNEL or CANYON? I’ll wait on that. What is BOOBY, besides the obvious? Hmm. Oh, maybe RAPIDS, SLAM, JURY, and CANYON are all words that go with “grand.” Nope! OK, maybe SLAM goes with FLAME, SKEWER, and KNOCK, which could all be verbs for criticizing or insulting. 🟩 ZOOM CALL is an interesting one. I’m not sure what to group that with. Maybe TUNNEL, CANYON, and HALLWAY go together as narrow channels. I’m not sure about a fourth there. I guess DOOR and ZOOM CALL are both things one could answer, but I don’t see others to go with them. I think CATARACT might actually go with CURRENT, RAPIDS, and WHIRLPOOL—I’m pretty sure that’s another term for a waterfall? 🟨 Yes! These last eight are tough. BOOBY could refer to a bird, like a blue-footed BOOBY. I don’t see any other bird words. Maybe TUNNEL, CANYON, HALLWAY, and DOOR? Those are all passageways, sort of. “One away.” Oh, maybe ZOOM CALL goes with TUNNEL, CANYON, and HALLWAY as places where you might hear an echo. 🟦 That leaves JURY, FIRST, BOOBY, and DOOR. No idea. 🟪 Hmm, ___ PRIZE? Apparently a JURY PRIZE is what’s awarded at Cannes, but I think it can also refer to any award given by a voting body; FIRST PRIZE refers to a gold medal or blue ribbon; a BOOBY PRIZE is a a gift “given as a joke to the last-place finisher in a race or competition” (according to Google); and a DOOR PRIZE is something given away at an event, like a raffle, where the only requirement for winning is showing up. I hadn’t heard the terms BOOBY PRIZE or a JURY PRIZE before. Today was tough! How to play ConnectionsI have a full guide to playing Connections, but here’s a refresher on the rules: First, find the Connections game either on the New York Times website or in their Games app (formerly the Crossword app). You’ll see a game board with 16 tiles, each with one word or phrase. Your job is to select a group of four tiles that have something in common. Often they are all the same type of thing (for example: RAIN, SLEET, HAIL, and SNOW are all types of wet weather) but sometimes there is wordplay involved (for example, BUCKET, GUEST, TOP TEN, and WISH are all types of lists: bucket list, guest list, and so on). Select four items and hit the Submit button. If you guessed correctly, the category and color will be revealed. (Yellow is easiest, followed by green, then blue, then purple.) If your guess was incorrect, you’ll get a chance to try again. You win when you’ve correctly identified all four groups. But if you make four mistakes before you finish, the game ends and the answers are revealed. How to win ConnectionsThe most important thing to know to win Connections is that the groupings are designed to be tricky. Expect to see overlapping groups. For example, one puzzle seemed to include six breakfast foods: BACON, EGG, PANCAKE, OMELET, WAFFLE, and CEREAL. But BACON turned out to be part of a group of painters along with CLOSE, MUNCH, and WHISTLER, and EGG was in a group of things that come by the dozen (along with JUROR, ROSE, and MONTH). So don’t hit “submit” until you’ve confirmed that your group of four contains only those four things. If you’re stuck, another strategy is to look at the words that seem to have no connection to the others. If all that comes to mind when you see WHISTLER is the painting nicknamed “Whistler’s Mother,” you might be on to something. When I solved that one, I ended up googling whether there was a painter named Close, because Close didn’t fit any of the obvious themes, either. Another way to win when you’re stuck is, obviously, to read a few helpful hints–which is why we share these pointers every day. Check back tomorrow for the next puzzle! (责任编辑:) |