NYT Connections today hints and answers — Sunday, August 18 (#434)

Looking for today’s Connections answers? The Connections answers on August 18 for puzzle #434 takes a leap in difficulty compared to yesterday’s answers, with the Connections Companion rating this puzzle’s difficulty at 3.4 out of 5.

Every day, we update this article with Connections hints and tips to help you find all 4 of today’s answers. And if the hints aren’t enough, you’ll find all 4 answers below, with the category titles and the correlating words. Plus, we’re including a reflection on yesterday’s puzzle, #433, in case you’re reading this in a different time zone.

Spoilers lie ahead for Connections #434. Only read on if you want to know today’s Connections answers.  

Alternatively, visit our how to play NYT Connections guide for tips on how to solve the puzzle without our help.

Today’s Connections answer — hints to help you solve it

Unlike our guide to today’s Wordle answer, where we recommend the best Wordle start words as your strategy, solving Connections relies on identifying connecting categories among 16 words. Each category’s difficulty level is represented by a color; yellow is the easiest grouping, and purple is the most challenging. Once you’ve made 4 mistakes in your guesses, the answers will be revealed, so hints can be helpful.

If you need hints to solve the groupings, then here are the themes of each, based on the order of difficulty:

• 🟨 Yellow: Alarm clock buttons
• 🟩 Green: Here’s a thought
• 🟦 Blue: Candy pieces
• 🟪 Purple: Seven dwarfs minus last letter

These hints should get you at least some of the way towards finding today’s Connections answers. If not, then you can read on for bigger clues; or, if you just want to know the answer, then scroll down further.

Here’s a larger hint: Whistle while you work all you like, but don’t forget to set your wake-up reminder, catch up on the latest office gossip, and snag a sweet little treat (you’ve earned it). 

Today’s Connections answers

So, what are today’s Connections answers for game #434?

Drumroll, please…

• 🟨 Alarm clock buttons: Alarm, hour, snooze, time set
• 🟩 Here’s a thought…: Perhaps, say, suppose, what if
• 🟦 Candy pieces: Kiss, nerd, runt, whopper
• 🟪 Seven dwarves minus last letter: Do, dope, grump, sleep

I can see why today’s puzzle has such a difficult spike. That purple category is downright diabolical. 

Only the green category came easily to me this time. What If and Suppose are close enough that they immediately stood out, followed by Perhaps and Say once I brainstormed common ways we phrase questions. 

Next came the yellow category, but by then I’d already screwed up once. I thought Nerd, Runt, Grump and Dope might be connected because they can all be used as insults. When I struck out with that line of thinking, I wondered what else could Time Set be if not something to do with an alarm clock, and so Alarm, Hour, and Snooze fell into place. 

The blue category was a tricky one, with Kiss, Nerd, Runt, and Whopper all referring to candy pieces, and not playground insults or Burger King burgers, as I mistakenly thought. 

I was all out of guesses before I could solve the purple category. Dope, Grump, and Sleep now seem obvious even if they weren’t immediately, but I don’t think I ever would have put Do (as in, the name Doc minus the “c”) together with them on my own. You win this time, Connections Crew. 

Yesterday’s Connections answers

Reading this in a later time zone? Here are the Connections answers for game #433, which had a difficulty rating of 1.8 out of 5, according to the Connections Companion.

Yesterday Scott said that his date night later that evening could have been why the green category came leaping out to him first. It was a quick snag to get french, kiss, make out, and neck.

The yellow category stood out next where he got dialect, language, speech and tongue.

It was a bit of a coin flip but he went with what appeared to be housing styles with cottage, craftsman, prairie and ranch. 

The blue category was a simple fill from there with first aid kit items; bandage, dressing, scissors and tape.

It’s a quick one today, enjoy and have a good weekend.