Connections
Sort sixteen words into four groups of four. A wrong group spends one of four mistakes.
DleBox's guide
Connections, from the New York Times, lays out sixteen words. Your job is to find four sets of four. A set can be a straight category, a set of synonyms, or a trick that only works if you notice the shared shape of the words. Selecting four and submitting is the whole move. If those four are a real group, they leave the board in a color. If they are not, you lose one of four lives.
The puzzle often hides one obvious group so the remaining words look related when they are not. One mistake is recoverable. Four mistakes end the day. You can shuffle the tiles when a row is distracting. There is no partial credit for three of a kind. The game wants the group, not a clever pair.
DleBox does not host the board and does not post the four groups. The link goes to the Times. Yesterday's groups are not archived here. If you came from a Wordle habit, the difference is that Connections has no secret string to uncover letter by letter. The words are already visible. The work is the sorting.
Rules
- Sixteen words, four groups, four words each.
- You may make four mistakes.
- A guess is four words submitted together.
- One shared puzzle is posted for the day.
- DleBox does not print the groups.
Why we like it
- ✓ Every word is visible, so the puzzle is recognition.
- ✓ A red herring is part of the design, not a glitch.
- ✓ The round ends when the groups are found or the mistakes run out.
On this list, Strands also starts from a theme, but it hides the words in a letter grid and then asks for one spanning word. Connections keeps every word in sight. Queens and Sudoku, nearby in spirit, are placement puzzles rather than vocabulary. Use Connections when the fun is noticing why four words belong together.
The four colors the Times uses are a result, not a score you can raise by finding a rarer group. Once a group locks, it is done. DleBox will not rank groups from clever to obvious, because that ranking would be today's answer written in a polite order. Shuffle the board on their site if a row is distracting. Nothing on this page changes the sixteen words.
About the game
Connections is published by The New York Times. DleBox did not make that game. This page names the maker and links over. It does not speak for them.
- Category:
- Words. Open the Words category.
- Updates:
- Once a day on the original site.
- Reset:
- This page does not state their timezone. The original game shows the day's puzzle.
More in Words
Games like Connections
A longer list of games like Connections, with one sentence on why each one is nearby.