Skip to main content

Digital Trends may earn a commission when you buy through links on our site. Why trust us?

NYT Connections: hints and answers for Monday, November 11

New York Times' Connection puzzle open in the NYT Games app on iOS.
Sam Hill / Digital Trends

Connections is one of the best puzzle games from the New York Times. The game tasks you with categorizing a pool of 16 words into four secret (for now) groups by figuring out how the words relate to each other. The puzzle resets every night at midnight and each new puzzle has a varying degree of difficulty. Just like Wordle, you can keep track of your winning streak and compare your scores with friends.

Some days are trickier than others — just like other NYT Games favorites The Mini and Strands. If you’re having a little trouble solving today’s puzzle, check out our Connections tips and tricks guide for some good strategies or check out the hints for today’s Connections puzzle below. And if you still can’t get it, we’ll tell you today’s answers at the very end.

Recommended Videos

How to play Connections

Connections is a daily game about finding common threads between words. Players must select four groups of four words without making more than three mistakes. Play now. https://t.co/YITfSnqODb pic.twitter.com/CqObVOqeUs

— The New York Times (@nytimes) November 3, 2024

You can play Connections on the New York Times website or with the NYT Games app on iOS or Android.

In Connections, you’ll be shown a grid containing 16 words — your objective is to organize these words into four sets of four by identifying the connections that link them. These sets could encompass concepts like titles of video game franchises, book series sequels, shades of red, names of chain restaurants, etc.

There are generally words that seem like they could fit multiple themes, but there’s only one 100% correct answer. You’re able to shuffle the grid of words and rearrange them to help better see the potential connections.

Each group is color-coded. The yellow group is the easiest to figure out, followed by the green, blue, and purple groups.

Pick four words and hit Submit. If you’re correct, the four words will be removed from the grid and the theme connecting them will be revealed. Guess incorrectly and it’ll count as a mistake. You only have four mistakes available until the game ends.

Hints for today’s Connections

We can help you solve today’s Connection by telling you the four themes. If you need more assistance, we’ll also give you one word from each group below.

Today’s themes

  • CHOCOLATE BARS
  • GIST
  • KINDS OF BRAS
  • ___ BIRD

One-answer reveals

  • CHOCOLATE BARS – CRUNCH
  • GIST – CORE
  • KINDS OF BRAS – DEMI
  • ___ BIRD – BIG
New York Times Connection game logo.
New York Times

Today’s Connections answers

Still no luck? That’s OK. This puzzle is designed to be difficult.  If you just want to see today’s Connections answer, we’ve got you covered below:

Connections grids vary widely and change every day. If you couldn’t solve today’s puzzle, be sure to check back in tomorrow.

NYT Connection FAQs

What time does the Connections puzzle change?

The puzzle changes daily at midnight local time.

Who edits the NYT Connections game?

Wyna Liu, who has been editing puzzles at The New York Times since 2020, edits Connections daily.

“A few months ago, a new assignment crossed my desk: Create the game boards for Connections, a category matching game that had recently been greenlighted and was in search of an editor,” wrote Liu in an article explaining her process in June 2024. Most of my puzzle experience has been working with crosswords, and I was excited at the chance to try something different. I’ve enjoyed learning how puzzle editing plays out once a game is greenlighted, and seeing how our team fits into a larger ecosystem.”

On the one-year anniversary of Connections launching earlier this year, Liu posted this TikTok about her favorite puzzles so far:

@thegamesteam ? happy one year anniversary to connections, our newest official NYT game ? #nytgames #nytconnections #nyt ♬ The Kite Live by Luisa Marion – luisa_marion_music

Sam Hill
As Digital Trends' Gaming evergreen lead, Sam Hill is here to help you find your new favorite game and dive right in. The…
If you love Wordle and Connections, Puzzmo may be your next daily obsession
A cartoon orb does a Crossword puzzle in Puzzmo art.

If you’ve added puzzle games like Wordle and Connections to your routine in the past year, you might have another daily obsession coming your way. Puzzmo is a new platform that brings the idea of a newspaper puzzle page to a responsive web page that works across devices. Players can sign up to join the free platform today, which also features a $40 annual subscription option that unlocks bonus features like experimental games and leaderboards.

The ambitious new project is a collaboration between Orta Therox and Zach Gage, a game designer who’s gained popularity over the years with mobile titles like Knotwords and Good Sudoku. His latest project has been in the works for years, and it acts as a sort of one-stop shop for Gage’s puzzle catalog that looks to beat popular hubs like The New York Times at their own game.

Read more
Move over, Wordle: The New York Times has a new puzzle game
top tech stories of the week 7 24 2015 new york times starbucks deal

The New York Times has introduced the next title coming to its Games catalog following Wordle's continued success -- and it's all about math. Digits has players adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing numbers. You can play its beta for free online right now. 
In Digits, players are presented with a target number that they need to match. Players are given six numbers and have the ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide them to get as close to the target as they can. Not every number needs to be used, though, so this game should put your math skills to the test as you combine numbers and try to make the right equations to get as close to the target number as possible.

Players will get a five-star rating if they match the target number exactly, a three-star rating if they get within 10 of the target, and a one-star rating if they can get within 25 of the target number. Currently, players are also able to access five different puzzles with increasingly larger numbers as well.  I solved today's puzzle and found it to be an enjoyable number-based game that should appeal to inquisitive minds that like puzzle games such as Threes or other The New York Times titles like Wordle and Spelling Bee.
In an article unveiling Digits and detailing The New York Time Games team's process to game development, The Times says the team will use this free beta to fix bugs and assess if it's worth moving into a more active development phase "where the game is coded and the designs are finalized." So play Digits while you can, as The New York Times may move on from the project if it doesn't get the response it is hoping for. 
Digits' beta is available to play for free now on The New York Times Games' website

Read more
Wordle’s wild year: New York Times breaks down the phenomenon’s big 2022
Close-up of Wordle up on a smartphone.

If you logged onto Twitter exactly one year ago, you can probably recall the moment you began to see your feed fill up with gray, yellow, and green boxes. Though it launched in 2021 and gained mainstream popularity in December of that year, Wordle became a sudden cultural phenomenon in early 2022 that was inescapable outside of a muted words list. It was a rare gaming success story, one that could reach a broad audience thanks to its elegant simplicity.

Wordle’s fortune would escalate just as quickly as its user base. In late January 2022, the New York Times announced it had acquired the puzzle game from creator Josh Wardle in an undisclosed, low-seven-figure deal -- a left-field move that almost eclipsed Sony’s announcement that it was acquiring Destiny 2 developer Bungie just hours earlier. The move would spark some worry among fans, who feared that a corporate takeover of the most independent game imaginable could steal its soul.

Read more