The New York Times daily word game “Connections” continues to impress puzzle enthusiasts with its unique challenge of connecting words based on shared connections.

Another exciting mystery awaits fans on December 19th. Whether you’re looking for subtle clues or direct answers, here’s everything you need to complete today’s challenge and hone your puzzle-solving skills, as mentioned in Forbes’ report.

What is NYT Connections?

Connections is a widely popular daily word game available for free on the New York Times website and in the game app. The game resets daily at midnight, giving players a new grid of 16 words.

The goal is to group these words into four groups of four based on their common connections or themes.

There is a single correct solution for each daily puzzle. Players must carefully deduce connections as some words may fit into multiple categories, leading to potential missteps.

The difficulty level of each group is color-coded, with yellow being the easiest, blue and green being moderately challenging, and purple often associated with clever wordplay.Also Read: Jeff Bezos is currently one of the richest men in the world, but his biological father knew little about his huge advances in the world of technology. It was only after five decades that he learned of Bezos’ progress as a philanthropist and technology expert with a fortune worth billions. Here’s what happened

Players have four lives to solve the puzzle. Each wrong guess costs a life, while correct groups bring you closer to success.

A shuffle function is available to reshape the word grid and gain new insights.

Hints and insights for today’s puzzle

If you’re solving the NYT Connections puzzle for December 19th, here’s a breakdown of today’s 16 words:

Words: TAP, TUG, BARREL, BARREL, TABLE, SUB, BARGE, HAMMER, COUNTER, LADDER, GORILLA, SHELVE, JUNK, DELAY, STOOL, POSTPONE

Notes for the groups:

• Yellow group – words associated with “delay” or “postpone”.

• Green Group – Common furnishings in a bar

• Blue group – words related to watercraft

• Purple Group – Elements from the legendary video game Donkey Kong

For those who want to double-check their guesses or uncover the correct groupings, here are the answers to today’s connection puzzle:

• Yellow Group – Reset: DELAY, POSTPONE, SHELVE, TABLE

• Green Group – Bar equipment: COUNTER, KEG, STOOL, TAP

• Blue Group – Watercraft: BARGE, JUNK, SUB, TUG

• Purple Group – Seen in Donkey Kong: BARREL, GORILLA, HAMMER, LADDER

Strategy and common pitfalls

As with any Connections puzzle, today’s game requires careful analysis to avoid common pitfalls, as mentioned in a report by Forbes.

For example, the word TAP could easily belong to both the bar facilities group and the physical actions category.

Likewise, words like HAMMER and BARREL could lead players into unrelated groupings.

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One of the more challenging aspects of today’s puzzle was identifying the purple group associated with Donkey Kong.

Including GORILLA as a clue may seem simple, but linking it to LADDER, HAMMER and BARREL required familiarity with the classic game.

FAQs

How do I play previous Connections puzzles?
Subscribers with a NYT All Access or Games plan can explore the Connections archive with all previous puzzles.

What is the most difficult color in Connections?
When a player correctly identifies a group, its category is displayed along with a color-coded difficulty level: yellow represents the easiest, followed by green, blue, and purple the most challenging. Each Connections game contains a category for each difficulty level.