NYT 'Connections' September 2: Answers, Clues for Game #449

The New York Times is continuing to enjoy success with its daily online puzzles, with Connections being another example.

The daily brainteaser features 16 seemingly random words grouped together in a box.

The aim is to find four words that link together into a category, meaning that there are four groups all together.

Each of the categories is separated into four colors. The easier and often more obvious group of four will become yellow once found all together, followed by green, blue and finally the hardest or more obscure group being purple.

Once you have found one group of four words which are connected, they are essentially removed from the game and can no longer be selected while trying to find a link between the remaining words.

Stock image of a woman looking at her phone. Newsweek has provided some clues on how to solve Monday’s “Connections” online word game.

Jeremy Moeller/Getty Images

Users have four attempts, or lives, to correctly guess the four groups. If you are unable to get all four connections, the answers and their corresponding difficulty color will be revealed by the game at the end.

Connections was launched in June 2023, is now the news outlet’s second-most-played game after the mega smash hit of Wordle.

Wyna Liu, Connections editor, previously answered a series of questions about the game for The New York Times.

When asked what tips she can provide players, Liu said: “One suggestion that may help save some guesses is if you start selecting cards and notice that there are five or more that belong to that category, try pivoting to a different category before making that first guess.

“Doing so might take one of those extra cards out of contention, or at least remove a few cards from the board, making other categories easier to see.”

Liu also confirmed that the original placement of the 16 words at the start of each game is intentional, which can result in players thinking they are connected when they are not the answer the game is looking for.

Below, Newsweek has offered some clues to the categories and how to solve Monday’s game.