Sixteen words, four hidden groups of four. Find what links them before you run out of mistakes, then tap New puzzle and go again. There is no daily limit here: 3,000 original puzzles and counting.
How to play
- Pick four words you think belong together and press Submit.
- Right? The four words become a colored bar with the name of their group.
- Wrong? You lose one of your four mistakes. One away means three of the four are right.
- Find all four groups to win. Every word belongs to exactly one group, and every puzzle has exactly one solution.
What kinds of groups to expect
Each puzzle has one group of every color, from the most direct to the most devious:
- Yellow: plain sets of things, like fruits, dances or shades of blue. We have 120 of these.
- Green: synonyms, animal words and jargon, such as ways to walk, baby animals or poker terms (78).
- Blue: fill in the blank and phrases. SNOW, FOOT and EYE all go before BALL; RECORD, PROMISE and SILENCE are things you can break (87).
- Purple: wordplay. Words that hide an animal (sCATter), anagrams, words that sound like letters or rhyme with MOON (44).
Tips from the puzzle makers
- Look for the word that fits twice. Most puzzles have a red herring: EAGLE could be a bird or a golf score, MARS a planet or a Roman god. Find the group that has no other choice first.
- Count before you submit. If five words fit a group, one of them belongs somewhere else. Wait until the rest of the board tells you which.
- Try a blank. When four words make no sense together, test them in front of or after a common word: ___BOARD, ___FISH, HEAD___.
- Read them out loud and look inside them. Purple groups often sound like something (BEE, SEA, TEA) or hide something (PLANT has an ANT in it).
- Shuffle. A fresh layout breaks the pairs your eyes keep making.
Unlimited, daily and the archive
This page gives you a new puzzle every round and counts your wins in a row. Want the same puzzle as everyone else? Play the daily groups puzzle, which resets at midnight Eastern Time and keeps a day streak. Stuck on today's? The groups hints page reveals one clue at a time, and the archive has every past daily puzzle with its answers. Prefer guessing a single word? Try our infinite word game or the word finder.
Frequently asked questions
Is this the New York Times Connections game?
No. It is our own word grouping game with the same idea: sixteen words, four groups of four. Every puzzle and every category is original, and there is no daily limit. Connections is a trademark of The New York Times Company; this site is not affiliated with it.
How many mistakes can I make?
Four. Each wrong guess costs one of the dots under the board. If three of your four words belong together, you will see One away, which is a clue in itself.
What do the colors mean?
They show how tricky a group is. Yellow is the most direct (plain sets of things), green needs a second thought, blue is usually fill in the blank, and purple is wordplay: hidden words, anagrams and sound-alikes.
How are the puzzles made?
We write the categories by hand, 329 of them so far, and a program builds puzzles from them. It checks every word against every group in the puzzle, including hidden words and compound words, and keeps a puzzle only if there is exactly one way to solve it.
Can I get a hint?
Yes. Hint shows a clue for the easiest group you have not found yet, without giving away the words. Tap it again for the next group.
Is there a daily version?
Yes: the daily groups puzzle is the same for everyone and changes at midnight Eastern Time. Past days are in the archive, with the answers.