NYT Connections Today – Hints and Answers for Wednesday, November 13 (Game #521)
Good morning! Let’s play Connections, the NYT’s clever word game that challenges you to group answers into different categories. It can be tricky, so read on if you need pointers.
What should you do when you’re done? Of course, play some word games. I also have daily Wordle Hints and Answers, Strands Hints and Answers and Quordle Hints and Answers articles if you need help with those too.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about today’s NYT Connections is below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know the answers.
NYT Connections Today (Game #521) – Today’s Words
Today’s words from NYT Connections are…
- MUSTARD
- WING
- WEDNESDAY
- WORCESTERSHIRE
- COLONEL
- TARTAR
- LEMON
- MINION
- CALCULATION
- CANARY
- ADDITION
- PLACE
- EXTENSION
- PHARAOH
- CAVITY
- ANNEX
NYT Connections Today (Game #521) – Hint #1 – Group Hints
What are some pointers for current NYT Connections groups?
- Yellow: Coward!
- Vegetable: Extra piece of home/office, etc
- Blue: Infection could be another
- Purple: Missing syllables?
Need more clues?
We’re firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four themed answers are for today’s NYT Connections puzzles…
NYT Connections Today (Game #521) – Hint #2 – Group Answers
What are the answers for today’s NYT Connections groups?
- YELLOW: THINGS THAT ARE YELLOW
- GREEN: CONSTRUCTION ADVICE
- BLUE: GET A DENTIST
- PURPLE: WORDS THAT SEEM LONGER WRITTEN THAN SPOKEN
Okay, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Connections Today (Game #521) – The Answers
The answers to today’s Connections game, game #521, are…
- YELLOW: THINGS THAT ARE YELLOW CANARY, LEMON, MINION, MUSTARD
- GREEN: CONSTRUCTION ADVICE SUPPLEMENT, ANNEX, EXTENSION, WING
- BLUE: GET A DENTIST CALCULUS, CAVITY, PLAQUE, TARTARE
- PURPLE: WORDS THAT SEEM LONGER WRITTEN THAN SPOKEN COLONEL, PHARAOH, WEDNESDAY, WORCESTERSHIRE
- My rating: Moderate
- My score: Perfect
Well done if you solved today’s purple group with anything other than luck, because it’s a bit strange. I definitely needed some luck with it, because the connection – WORDS THAT SEEM LONGER WRITTEN THAN SPOKEN – is actually quite strange. For starters, isn’t part of this dependent on understanding how language works? Of course, if you didn’t know that PHARAOH had a silent second A, you might think it was pronounced PHAR-A-OH. But that also applies to KNOW (K-NO) or TRUE (T-RUE). It’s just English! I’m not sure that PHARAOH actually seems longer written than spoken. You might put WORCESTERSHIRE in that category, but only if you’ve never been to Britain. It all seems a bit random.
Admittedly, the way I encountered it had something to do with it. Instead I focused on missing syllables, though I gambled more with hope than expectation, and at that stage of the game I had very little idea what else it might be. I was not helped by my other problem group, blue, including a word I had never heard used in the context of CARING FOR A DENTIST, namely CALCULUS. Apparently that’s another term for TARTAR, so I don’t understand why both words are in there. All in all a bit unsatisfactory.
How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.
Yesterday’s NYT Connections answers (Tuesday, November 12, game #520)
- YELLOW: COMPLAINT stomach ache, carp, crab, grumble
- GREEN: VEGETABLE UNITS cloves, flower, spear, stem
- BLUE: LAPTOP SPECS RAM, RESOLUTION, SPEED, STORAGE
- PURPLE: CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PERSONALIZED RIGHT BLINDFOLD, ROBE, SCALES, SWORD
What is NYT Connections?
NYT Connections is one of the New York Times’ increasingly popular word games. It challenges you to find groups of four items that have something in common, and each group has a different level of difficulty: green is easy, yellow is slightly harder, blue is often quite hard, and purple is usually very hard.
On the plus side, you technically don’t have to solve the last question, because you can answer it by a process of elimination. Plus, you can make up to four mistakes, which gives you some breathing room.
It’s a bit more complicated than something like Wordle, though, and there are plenty of opportunities for the game to trip you up with tricks. For example, beware of homophones and other word games that can obscure the answers.
It is playable for free via the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
