The Sunday edition of NYT Connections arrives with puzzle #924, serving up a grid that rewards library knowledge and kitchenware familiarity. Today's challenge particularly favors those who can spot sneaky homophones and think beyond surface-level connections.
What Makes Connections Tick
For newcomers, NYT Connections presents 16 words that must be sorted into four thematic groups of four. The twist? You're limited to four mistakes, and the color-coded difficulty system (yellow being easiest, purple being trickiest) means surface-level connections often mislead.
Since its June 2023 launch, Connections has carved out its niche in the Times' puzzle ecosystem, standing alongside Wordle and the crossword as a daily ritual for millions of players worldwide. The game's genius lies in its red herrings, words that could fit multiple categories but belong in only one.
Today's Grid at a Glance
Here are the 16 words staring back at you in puzzle #924:
RAIN | LID | AIR | FLOW
EAVES | CIRCULATION | ISSUE | STACKS
SPOUT | GUM | REFERENCE | HANDLE
PERIODICALS | RESULT | STRAINER | EMERGE
A seemingly random collection that somehow connects into four perfect categories.
Strategic Hints (No Spoilers Yet)
Yellow Category Nudge: Think about what you'd find on a kitchen counter during teatime.
Green Category Clue: Where would you go in a library to find magazines or ask for help?
Blue Category Hint: These words all describe what happens when something comes forth or develops.
Purple Category Teaser: These words all complete a common two-word phrase starting with the same word.
The Full Solutions
Last chance to solve independently: answers below
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Yellow (FEATURES OF A TEAPOT): HANDLE, LID, SPOUT, STRAINER
The easiest category for anyone who's ever made a proper cup of tea. These are the four essential components of a teapot: the handle for pouring, the lid to keep heat in, the spout for directing the flow, and the strainer to catch loose leaves. The trap here is that "strainer" could also relate to kitchen gadgets or plumbing, but in this context, it's specifically the mesh insert found in many teapots.
Green (LIBRARY SECTIONS): CIRCULATION, PERIODICALS, REFERENCE, STACKS
This category requires library literacy. Circulation is where you check out books, periodicals house magazines and newspapers, reference contains dictionaries and encyclopedias, and stacks refer to the main book storage areas. The misdirection comes from "circulation" and "stacks" having other meanings - air circulation and stacks of papers - but here they're firmly in the library domain.
Blue (ARISE): EMERGE, FLOW, ISSUE, RESULT
These four words all serve as synonyms for "arise" or describe something coming into being. Emerge means to come forth, flow suggests a natural progression, issue can mean to come out or result from something, and result is the outcome that arises from a process. The challenge is that "issue" and "result" could easily fit other categories - "issue" with periodicals or "result" with outcomes - but here they're united by their relationship to emergence.
Purple (___DROP): AIR, EAVES, GUM, RAIN
The trickiest category relies on recognizing compound words. These all form phrases with "drop": air drop (military supply delivery), eavesdrop (to secretly listen), gumdrop (a type of candy), and raindrop (precipitation). The homophone play with "eavesdrop" is particularly clever, as "eaves" alone refers to the edge of a roof, not immediately suggesting the listening connotation.
The Verdict
Puzzle #924 registers as moderate difficulty with a sting in the tail. Yellow falls quickly for anyone who recognizes kitchenware components, while green requires thinking about library organization. Blue separates those who think about synonyms from those stuck on literal meanings. Purple, predictably, is the streak-ender, that compound word trick won't reveal itself without serious lateral thinking.
The real trap lies in words like "circulation" and "stacks" pulling double duty between library and general usage, and "issue" straddling the line between periodicals and emergence. "Gum" is particularly sneaky, as it could easily be mistaken for something dental or sticky rather than part of "gumdrop."
Reset and Repeat
Tomorrow's puzzle drops at midnight in your timezone. Until then, reflect on today's performance: did the library sections come easily, or did the teapot features stump you? The beauty lies not in perfection but in training your brain to spot these hidden patterns.
For now, puzzle #924 is solved. See you at midnight for round #925.
