Waking up to a grid of sixteen words can feel like a personal attack. You stare at them. They stare back. Most of us have a love-hate relationship with the New York Times Connections game because it doesn't just test your vocabulary; it tests how your brain organizes chaos. Honestly, the most frustrating part isn't missing a word—it’s realizing you fell for a "red herring" that felt so obvious five minutes ago.
The game has become a cultural staple. It’s the digital version of a crossword puzzle for people who don't have twenty minutes to spare but want to feel smart before their first coffee. If you've ever wondered what are the connections categories and how the logic behind them functions, you’re not alone. The game’s editor, Wyna Liu, creates these puzzles with a specific hierarchy of difficulty that ranges from "I can do this in my sleep" to "this makes absolutely no sense."
Understanding these categories is the only way to stop burning through your four mistakes by 8:00 AM.
The Color-Coded Logic of Connections
The game is built on a four-tier system. It’s not random. Each color represents a specific level of abstraction or wordplay complexity.
The Yellow category is the straightforward one. It’s usually a direct synonym group or a very obvious set. Think of things like "Types of Fruit" or "Ways to Walk." If you see "Stroll," "Saunter," "Amble," and "Walk," you’ve found yellow. It’s the "straight man" of the puzzle world. It doesn't try to trick you; it just sits there waiting to be clicked.
Green steps it up slightly. It’s still usually based on a common theme, but the words might be a bit more specialized. You might see a green category focusing on "Parts of a Car" or "Instruments in a Brass Band." It requires a bit more niche knowledge than yellow but stays within the realm of literal definitions.
Then we get to Blue. This is where things start getting weird. Blue often relies on specific cultural references or phrases. You might find "Movies with a Color in the Title" or "Slang for Money." It’s less about what the word is and more about how the word is used in a specific context.
Finally, there is Purple. Purple is the nightmare tier. It almost always involves wordplay, homophones, or "fill-in-the-blank" logic. If you see words like "Honey," "Sugar," "Sweetie," and "Salt," your brain thinks "Terms of Endearment." Wrong. That's a trap. Purple might actually be "Words that precede 'Mine'" (Honey-mine, Salt-mine, etc.). Purple is designed to be solved last by process of elimination because, frankly, the logic is often so meta it’s hard to see until the other twelve words are gone.
The Cruel Art of the Red Herring
You can't talk about what are the connections categories without addressing the overlaps. This is the game’s primary weapon.
Imagine you see the words "Bass," "Flounder," "Carp," and "Snook." You think: "Easy, fish." But then you see "Grumble" and "Complain." Now you realize "Carp," "Grumble," "Complain," and "Snook" (if used as a verb) might be a category about "To Grumble." The game deliberately puts five or six words that could fit into one category, forcing you to find the other connection for the extra words before you commit.
Wyna Liu has mentioned in interviews that the "overlap" is the most time-consuming part of the puzzle design. It’s a psychological game. The editor knows you're going to see the most obvious connection first. They want you to click it. They want you to fail.
Semantic vs. Structural Categories
If we dig deeper into the actual types of categories that appear week after week, we can split them into two main camps: semantic and structural.
Semantic categories are based on the meaning of the words. These are your standard "Types of Cheese" or "Synonyms for Large." Most people are good at these because our brains are naturally wired to group things by what they represent.
Structural categories are the ones that break people. These ignore the meaning of the word entirely. Instead, they look at how the word is built. Examples include:
- Words that are also US State Abbreviations: (AL, OR, HI, ME).
- Words that contain a hidden body part: (heart, barmy, ihandle).
- Palindromes: (Racecar, Kayak, Mom, Noon).
- Words that rhyme with a specific number: (Won, Blue, Tree, Door).
When you’re stuck, it’s usually because you’re looking for a semantic connection when the answer is structural. If you have four words that have absolutely nothing in common—like "Ape," "Care," "Part," and "Tale"—stop looking at what they mean. Look at how they’re spelled. (In this case, they are all anagrams of other words: Pea, Race, Trap, Late).
Real Examples from Famous Puzzles
Let’s look at some specific instances where the connections categories threw the internet for a loop.
In one famous puzzle, the categories included "Things that are 'Super'" (Bowl, Man, Nova, Market) and "Parts of a Book" (Cover, Page, Jacket, Spine). The trick was that "Jacket" and "Cover" also fit into a potential "Clothing" category that didn't exist.
Another brutal example involved the words: "Mule," "Pump," "Slide," and "Flat." To someone who doesn't follow fashion, these are just random nouns and verbs. To a shoe enthusiast, these are "Types of Women's Shoes." This highlights the "knowledge barrier" that often appears in the Blue and Green categories. The game assumes a certain level of broad cultural literacy. If you don't know that a "Mule" is a shoe, you're going to spend ten minutes trying to connect it to "Donkey" or "Smuggler."
Why Your Brain Struggles With Certain Tiers
Cognitive psychology plays a huge role here. We use something called "spreading activation." When you see the word "Apple," your brain automatically "lights up" related concepts: "Fruit," "Red," "iPhone," "Teacher."
The Connections game works by intentionally lighting up the "wrong" pathways. If the word is "Bridge," the game wants you to think of "Water" or "Architecture." It doesn't want you to think of the card game. By the time you realize "Bridge," "Hearts," "Solitaire," and "Spades" go together, you might have already tried to group "Bridge" with "Tunnel" and "Road."
The most successful players are those who can "inhibit" their first instinct. They see a group of four, but instead of clicking, they scan the rest of the board to see if a fifth or sixth word could also fit. If there’s a fifth word, the category is a trap.
Misconceptions About the Difficulty
Many people think the game gets harder as the week goes on, similar to the NYT Crossword (which is easiest on Monday and hardest on Saturday).
That’s actually a myth.
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While individual puzzles vary, there isn't a strict "Weekly Difficulty Curve" for Connections in the same way. A Tuesday puzzle can be significantly harder than a Thursday puzzle depending on your specific vocabulary and life experiences. If you're a scientist, a category about "Noble Gases" will be Yellow for you, even if the editor marked it as Blue.
The difficulty is subjective. It’s based on your "lexical neighborhood." This is why the game is so shareable on social media; your friend might find the "Purple" category in five seconds because they happen to be an expert in 1970s funk bands, while you’re sitting there wondering why "Brick" and "House" are in the same group.
Navigating the "Fill-in-the-Blank" Traps
The "_____ Word" or "Word _____ " categories are almost always Purple. These are the hardest to spot because the connecting word isn't even on the board.
For example:
- ____ Cake: (Cup, Fruit, Layer, Wedding)
- Fire ____: (Alphan, Drill, Escape, Works)
- Words that end in a bird: (Spatula, Casually, Waybill, Kidnap) — Okay, that one is an extreme example of how tricky it gets.
When you have two or three words left that seem to have zero relation, try placing a common word before or after them. "Salt," "Pepper," "Water," and "Suit" don't match. But add "Sea" in front? Sea salt, sea pepper (wait, no), sea water, sea suit (no). Try again. "Power," "Pressure," "Suit," "Jump." Add "Blood"? Blood power (no). Add "Jump"? Jump suit, jump start... no.
It's a process of mental trial and error.
Actionable Insights for Your Next Game
If you want to stop losing your streak, change your tactical approach. Most people fail because they are too impulsive.
- Don't click your first discovery. If you find four words that fit together, great. Now look for a fifth. If there is a fifth word that fits that same theme, do not submit. You haven't found the real category yet; you've found the trap.
- Say the words out loud. Sometimes the connection is phonetic. "Key," "Quay," "Chi," and "Cay" all sound the same but look completely different. Your eyes will deceive you, but your ears might catch the rhyme or the homophone.
- Work backwards from the weirdest word. Find the most obscure word on the grid—something like "Episodic" or "Fritter." Ask yourself what that word must be part of. It’s much easier to find a home for a specific word than to find a home for a common word like "Go" or "Set," which could belong to fifty different categories.
- Ignore the meanings entirely if you're stuck. If the "definitions" aren't working, start looking at the letters. Are they all palindromes? Do they all start with a Roman numeral? Do they all contain a double letter? This is almost always the key to the Purple tier.
- Use the Shuffle button. Our brains get stuck in "spatial ruts." We think words are connected because they are sitting next to each other on the grid. Shuffling the board breaks those accidental visual associations and can help you see a connection you were literally overlooking.
The game is a test of flexibility. The more you play, the more you start to recognize the "flavor" of the categories. You’ll start to see a "fill-in-the-blank" coming from a mile away. You’ll realize that "Lead" is probably a metal, not a verb, because there’s another word like "Tin" or "Zinc" hiding in the corner.
Ultimately, Connections is about the "Aha!" moment. It’s designed to make you feel slightly annoyed until the second it all clicks, and then you feel like a genius. Understanding the categories is just the first step in mastering that mental tug-of-war.