A new NYT Strands puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Friday's puzzle instead then click here: NYT Strands hints and answers for Friday, January 16 (game #684).
Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.
Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.
NYT Strands today (game #685) - hint #1 - today's theme
What is the theme of today's NYT Strands?
• Today's NYT Strands theme is… That's putting it mildly!
NYT Strands today (game #685) - hint #2 - clue words
Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.
- TARN
- PONY
- RATE
- PHASE
- SACKED
- CAKE
NYT Strands today (game #685) - hint #3 - spangram letters
How many letters are in today's spangram?
• Spangram has 11 letters
NYT Strands today (game #685) - hint #4 - spangram position
What are two sides of the board that today's spangram touches?
First side: bottom, 1st column
Last side: top, 4th column
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Strands today (game #685) - the answers
The answers to today's Strands, game #685, are…
- DRAT
- CURSES
- FIDDLESTICKS
- TARNATION
- PHOOEY
- SPANGRAM: FOILEDAGAIN
- My rating: Easy
- My score: Perfect
I love a polite swearword. If you hear someone curse “fudge” or “sugar” it is firstly very funny, but secondly also pointless because everyone knows what you are really trying to say.
Perhaps a better option is to come up with something a bit more creative, like calling someone the son of an aardvark or yelling peanuts when you accidentally hurt yourself. There is a brilliant story a UK journalist called Jon Ronson wrote about being asked by his son what the worst swearword in the world was, and he randomly replied “limone” – it worked, for a while, until one day he returned home from school and called his father a very, very rude word for lying to him.
Anyway, I digress. A great, fun search in which I thankfully was not FOILEDAGAIN.
Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Friday, January 16, game #684)
- JOKER
- ROBIN
- CAPE
- MANOR
- JUSTICE
- PENGUIN
- VENGEANCE
- SPANGRAM: BATMAN
What is NYT Strands?
Strands is the NYT's not-so-new-any-more word game, following Wordle and Connections. It's now a fully fledged member of the NYT's games stable that has been running for a year and which can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
I've got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you're struggling to beat it each day.
