NYT Connections today — hints and answers for Thursday, November 14 (game #522)

NYT Connections homescreen on a phone, on a purple background
(Image credit: New York Times)

Good morning! Let's play Connections, the NYT's clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need clues.

What should you do once you've finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I've also got daily Strands hints and answers, Quordle hints and answers and Wordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too. And you might need them for the latter at least, because today's Wordle is so difficult it nearly cost me my 1,045-game streak.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Connections today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

Your Connections expert
Marc McLaren
Your Connections expert
Marc McLaren

Marc is TechRadar’s Global Editor in Chief and has been obsessed with Wordle and its ilk for more than two years. He's authored dozens of articles on the game for TechRadar, including a daily today's Wordle answer column and a detailed analysis of the most common letters in Wordle in every position. He's also played every Wordle ever and only lost once and yes, he takes it all too seriously.

NYT Connections today (game #522) - today's words

NYT Connections hints for game 522 on a purple background

(Image credit: New York Times)

Today's NYT Connections words are…

  • GRAIN
  • DRAIN
  • TOTAL
  • CUBE
  • SYRUP
  • SHRED
  • SIGNATURE
  • SAP
  • JAM
  • TAX
  • POWDER
  • ROCK
  • EMPTY
  • GROOVE
  • TIP
  • EXHAUST

NYT Connections today (game #522) - hint #1 - group hints

What are some clues for today's NYT Connections groups?

  • Yellow: Use up
  • Green: I'm really feeling this, man
  • Blue: Service not included
  • Purple: The sweetest thing

Need more clues?

We're firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four theme answers are for today's NYT Connections puzzles…

NYT Connections today (game #522) - hint #2 - group answers

What are the answers for today's NYT Connections groups?

  • YELLOW: DEPLETE
  • GREEN: PLAY MUSIC WITH PASSION
  • BLUE: WORDS ON A RESTAURANT RECEIPT
  • PURPLE: FORMS OF SUGAR

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Connections today (game #522) - the answers

NYT Connections answers for game 522 on a purple background

(Image credit: New York Times)

The answers to today's Connections, game #522, are…

  • YELLOW: DEPLETE DRAIN, EMPTY, EXHAUST, SAP
  • GREEN: PLAY MUSIC WITH PASSION GROOVE, JAM, ROCK, SHRED
  • BLUE: WORDS ON A RESTAURANT RECEIPT SIGNATURE, TAX, TIP, TOTAL
  • PURPLE: FORMS OF SUGAR CUBE, GRAIN, POWDER, SYRUP

  • My rating: Easy
  • My score: Perfect

This is probably one of the easiest Connections games we've had in a few weeks. The first couple of groups, yellow and green, were obvious collections of synonyms, while blue was not much harder; it doesn't take a genius to spot that TAX, TIP and TOTAL go together, and in that context SIGNATURE is an easy addition. Would I have got purple, FORMS OF SUGAR, if not by default? We'll never know for sure, but I suspect that if the other three hadn't been so simple I might have put POWDER and GRAIN together at least, then built from there. I'm not complaining, of course – I've had a couple of failures lately, so I'll take every victory I get, even if it wasn't a particularly challenging game.

How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.


Yesterday's NYT Connections answers (Wednesday, 13 November, game #521)

  • YELLOW: THINGS THAT ARE YELLOW CANARY, LEMON, MINION, MUSTARD
  • GREEN: BUILDING ADD-ONS ADDITION, ANNEX, EXTENSION, WING
  • BLUE: CONCERNS FOR A DENTIST CALCULUS, CAVITY, PLAQUE, TARTAR
  • PURPLE: WORDS THAT SEEM LONGER WRITTEN THAN SPOKEN COLONEL, PHARAOH, WEDNESDAY, WORCESTERSHIRE

What is NYT Connections?

NYT Connections is one of several increasingly popular word games made by the New York Times. It challenges you to find groups of four items that share something in common, and each group has a different difficulty level: green is easy, yellow a little harder, blue often quite tough and purple usually very difficult.

On the plus side, you don't technically need to solve the final one, as you'll be able to answer that one by a process of elimination. What's more, you can make up to four mistakes, which gives you a little bit of breathing room.

It's a little more involved than something like Wordle, however, and there are plenty of opportunities for the game to trip you up with tricks. For instance, watch out for homophones and other word games that could disguise the answers.

It's playable for free via the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.

TOPICS
Marc McLaren
Global Editor in Chief

Marc is TechRadar’s Global Editor in Chief, the latest in a long line of senior editorial roles he’s held in a career that started the week that Google launched (nice of them to mark the occasion). Prior to joining TR, he was UK Editor in Chief on Tom’s Guide, where he oversaw all gaming, streaming, audio, TV, entertainment, how-to and cameras coverage. He's also a former editor of the tech website Stuff and spent five years at the music magazine NME, where his duties mainly involved spoiling other people’s fun. He’s based in London, and has tested and written about phones, tablets, wearables, streaming boxes, smart home devices, Bluetooth speakers, headphones, games, TVs, cameras and pretty much every other type of gadget you can think of. An avid photographer, Marc likes nothing better than taking pictures of very small things (bugs, his daughters) or very big things (distant galaxies). He also enjoys live music, gaming, cycling, and beating Wordle (he authors the daily Wordle today page).