science

The New York Times Connections

The New York Times Connections is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand The New York Times Connections rather than just read about it. In short: Connections is a daily category-matching puzzle developed and published by The New York Times as part of The New York Times Games. It was released on June 12, 2023, during its beta phase.

Key takeaways

The New York Times Connections belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect The New York Times Connections to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of The New York Times Connections from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Connections is a daily category-matching puzzle developed and published by The New York Times as part of The New York Times Games. It was released on June 12, 2023, during its beta phase. It is the second-most-played game that is published by The New York Times, behind Wordle. The puzzles are written by editor Wyna Liu.

Gameplay

In Connections, the goal is to divide a grid of sixteen terms into four groups of four such that the terms in each group belong to a specific category (e.g., "dog", "cat", "fish", and "parrot" for the category "Household Pets"). The categories may involve wordplay such as palindromes or homophones, increasing the difficulty. Red herrings frequently occur, with groups of four which seemingly belong together (such as "north", "south", "east" and "west") but are actually to be sorted into different categories based on different, more subtle connections with other words. When a player successfully identifies a group, its category is revealed along with a color-coded difficulty level: categories are rated yellow, green, blue, or purple, with yellow being the most straightforward and purple being the most difficult. Each Connections game has one category from each difficulty level. The puzzle on April 1, 2024 (April Fools' Day) used emojis instead of words. For April Fools' Day in 2025, the game consisted of symbols and letters. For April Fool's Day in 2026, the game used different fonts, colors, and plays on words. For the 1,000th edition of Connections on March 7, 2026, the puzzle used a symbol of the game's icon for one of the playing tiles.

Development The games department of The New York Times hosts an annual game jam in which participants suggest ideas for upcoming games to release to the website. Connections had been in development for a year before releasing in its beta phase on June 12, 2023. The puzzles are written by Wyna Liu, who is also a crossword editor at The New York Times. Liu cited cartoonist Robert Leighton as an inspiration for lateral and visual word play. Several people associated with Only Connect, a British television quiz show, have commented on the similarity between Connections and the Connecting Wall segment of the program.

Sports edition

On September 24, 2024, The Athletic, in partnership with The New York Times Games, launched a sports edition of Connections in beta. The sports edition features the same gameplay as the regular version, with each grouping sports-themed. The game was officially launched on February 9, 2025, to coincide with Super Bowl LIX. Games are written by The Athletic's managing editor for news, Mark Cooper, who became the site's puzzle editor with the launch. Cooper said that unlike the original version, which he called a word game, the sports edition relied more on a trivia component to solve, with Cooper trying to include one category each game that is trivia based. Additionally, Cooper tries to have the purple category feature wordplay like the original. With the game's official launch, an optional timer for completing the puzzle was added. In September 2025, themed puzzles for all 32 NFL teams were created to coincide with the start of the 2025 NFL season, and were available for the entire month. A separate soccer-themed version was launched in June 2026 to run concurrent with the 2026 FIFA World Cup, being available for the duration of the World Cup.

References

External links Official website

Illustrations

Connections Sports logo

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with The New York Times Connections

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what The New York Times Connections claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to The New York Times Connections before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about The New York Times Connections ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of The New York Times Connections

In research: The New York Times Connections appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses The New York Times Connections in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: The New York Times Connections is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2023 video games, Android (operating system) games, Browser games, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for The New York Times Connections outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study The New York Times Connections in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what The New York Times Connections means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain The New York Times Connections out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is The New York Times Connections in simple terms?

Connections is a daily category-matching puzzle developed and published by The New York Times as part of The New York Times Games. It was released on June 12, 2023, during its beta phase.

Why does The New York Times Connections matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study The New York Times Connections?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on The New York Times Connections.