NYT Connections Answers Today (May 9): Tricky Wordplay? Today’s Puzzle Brings A Mix Of Screens, Memories, & Math
NYT Connections Answers Today: If today's Connections puzzle from The New York Times has you scratching your head, you're not alone. Puzzle #697, released on Friday, May 9, serves up a brain-teasing mix of words designed to test both your logic and your vocabulary. From the hazy fog of memory to the glare of a TV screen, today’s word groupings span diverse themes — and yes, it’s harder than it looks.
Here’s a closer look at what made this edition so puzzling, plus the themes that eventually tie everything together (if you made it that far without exhausting your guesses).
Puzzle Basics: What’s the Game All About?
Connections is the NYT’s daily puzzle that tasks players with grouping 16 seemingly unrelated words into four categories of four. Each group has a unifying theme — but as fans know, red herrings are everywhere. One wrong assumption can quickly lead you down the rabbit hole.
To make things even trickier, each group is colour-coded based on difficulty:
- Yellow (Easiest)
- Green (Moderate)
- Blue (Hard)
- Purple (Most Difficult)
The challenge? Identify all four groups before you hit four incorrect attempts. If you do, the game ends — and you’re forced to face the solution.
Yellow: Adjust Your Screen, Not Your Eyes
The easiest category today leans into home entertainment tech. The words Brightness, Color, Contrast, and Tint gare rouped neatly under the theme: TV Display Settings.
Green: That Feels... Faintly Familiar?
This category focused on things remembered — or barely remembered. Dim, Faint, Remote, and Vague captured the essence of Fuzzy, As A Memory.
Blue: It All Adds Up (Eventually)
If you spotted the mathematical angle, this set might have clicked. Sum, Product, Difference, and Quotient all pointed to the theme: Results Of Some Arithmetic.
Purple: One Window, Many Treatments
The hardest of the bunch had players thinking home décor — but in singular form. The trick was spotting Blind, Drape, Shade, and Shutter as examples of Window Treatments In The Singular.
As always, Connections walked the fine line between clever and confounding. Whether you solved it with surgical precision or stumbled on misleading links, there’s no denying the thrill of that “Aha!” moment when it all clicks.
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