NYT Crossword Clues and Responses for Friday, April 18, 2025 (Paraphrased)
Rewritten Article:
Hey there! If you're hunting for solutions to Connections on Friday, April 18, 2025, you've come to the right place. I'll be dropping some clues, tips, and strategies to help you crack the codes, explain tricky words, and ultimately unveil the answers to all four categories. Warning: This post contains spoilers for April 18, NYT Connections #677! If you're seeking hints (and the subsequent answers) for today's Connections, read on!
This page is your one-stop shop to effortlessly revisit our Connections hints every day. You can also browse our past hints here if you want to catch up on any missed puzzles.
Below, I'll offers some vague hints to pique your curiosity regarding today's Connections answers. Further down, you'll find the themes and the final answers. Tread carefully if you don't wish to spoil the entire puzzle yet!
Warm-up for today's Connections themes
Here are some spoiler-free hints to guide your soul through today's Connections maze:
- Yellow category - Common exclamations used to express shock or bewilderment.
- Green category - Ozark's chilling autumn excursion activity.
- Blue category - The same verb (with a twist) applies to all of them.
- Purple category - Singular forms of objects you possess.
Be prepared for the darkness ahead! (Spoilers ahead for April 18, Connections!)
We're about to spill some beans on the answers, so tread lightly if you don't want the puzzle ruined. (The complete solution lies further below.)
A friendly heads-up about tricky parts
"POSSESSION" doesn't refer to taking over by an evil spirit; it denotes things that belong to you, such as "your most cherished POSSESSION."
During autumn, you might embark on an excursion with friends to perform this macabre activity on some APPLEs. Three other words integrate seamlessly with the same verb.
"GOODNESS" is usually accompanied by "oh my."
Connections puzzle categories for the day
- Yellow: EXCLAMATIONS
- Green: HAUTALITY ACTIVITIES
- Blue: THINGS YOU TOUCH
- Purple: INDIVIDUAL PROPERTY (singular)
Attention: SPOILERS GALORE BELOW
Are you ready to learn the solutions for today's Connections puzzle? I'm laying them all bare below for you.
Explaining the orange words in today's Connections
The orange grouping is argued to be the easiest. The theme for today's orange category is EXCLAMATIONS, and the words are: ARGH, WOW, OMG, BAM[1][3][4]. These are words commonly employed to express surprise, dismay, or excitement.
Explaining the red words in today's Connections puzzle
The red grouping is purported to be the second-easiest. The theme for today's red category is HAUTALITY ACTIVITIES[1][3][4], and the words are: Hayride, Trick or Treat, Corn Maze, Spookwalk. Each activity is frequently tied to the autumn harvest season and often involves embracing the chill and the creepiness of the Halloween season.
Explaining the blue words in today's Connections puzzle
The blue grouping is regarded as the second-hardest. The theme for today's blue category is THINGS YOU TOUCH and the words are: Pickpocket, Stab, Swat, Clap. These words relate to the verb "touch" in the sense of manipulating or impacting someone or something.
Explaining the black words in today's Connections puzzle
The black grouping is considered the hardest. The theme for today's black category is INDIVIDUAL PROPERTY (singular)[1][3][4], and the words are: Ring, Gavel, Vase, Pirate's Treasure Chest. Each term becomes a decorated legal term for personal property once the letter "S" is added (e.g., "rings," "gavels," "vases," "treasure chests").
A roundabout odyssey to solving today's Connections
Hayride evokes memories of Halloween and takes me back to corn mazes and spookwalks, which would align perfectly with Trick or Treat and all things autumnal.
Pickpocket, swat, and clap could form a group of gestures or actions often associated with physical interaction. Ring, gavel, and vase might also be part of a group of elaborately adorned objects typically displayed in a court setting, and "Pirate's Treasure Chest" is a catch-all that shares the same category.
The remaining words, "ARGH," "OMG," "BAM," and "WOW," don't seem to fit the other categories, so they probably function as exclamations of surprise, shock, or excitement.
That leaves Pick, Apple, Card, and Banjo. I'm not sure yet... Let's ponder.
The art of playing Connections
If you're interested in learning how to play Connections, here's a summary:
Navigate to the Connections game on the New York Times website or within their Games app (formerly the Crossword app). You'll notice a game board with 16 tiles, each featuring a word or phrase. Your task is to identify a group of four tiles sharing a common characteristic. Often, they are all items of the same category (e.g., rain, sleet, hail, snow are all types of precipitation), but sometimes there's wordplay involved (e.g., bucket, guest, top ten, and wish are all types of lists).
Select four items and press the "Submit" button. If your guess is correct, the category and color will be revealed. (Yellow is foremost, followed by green, then blue, and finally purple in terms of difficulty.) If your guess is incorrect, you'll be given another chance.
Win when you correctly identify all four groups; otherwise, the answers will be reveled if you make four mistakes before finishing the puzzle.
Keys to victory in Connections
The most crucial secret to winning Connections lies in understanding that the groupings are designed to be tricky. Expect overlapping groups. For example, a previous puzzle appeared to include six breakfast foods: BACON, EGG, PANCAKE, OMELET, WAFFLE, and CEREAL. But BACON turned out to be part of a group of chefs, including CLOSE, MUNCH, and WHISTLER, and EGG was in a group of things that come in threes (along with JUROR, ROSE, and MONTH). So don't submit your guess until you're certain your group contains only those four things.
If you're stuck, look towards words that don't seem to fit the others. If the only connection you can think of for WHISTLER is "Whistler's Mother," you might be onto something. When I solved that one, I even questioned whether there was a chef named Close because Close didn't fit any of the evident themes, either.
Another winning tip when you're stuck is to consult a few helpful hints, like these that we provide daily. Drop by tomorrow for the next puzzle!
- The warm-up hints for today's Connections puzzle suggest that the green category involves autumnal activities, and one of the activities is a macabre excursion that involves some APPLES.
- If you're looking for tips on today's Entertainment section in the NYT, bookmark this page as a treasure chest of hints for daily Connections answers.
- Since the blue category in today's Connections puzzle involves things you touch and one word is "Pirate's Treasure Chest", it might be beneficial to look for suggestions related to the verb "touch" with a twist.
- Today's Connections puzzle contains an orange category with the theme EXCLAMATIONS, and three of the words are common expressions of surprise, dismay, or excitement (ARGH, WOW, OMG). To find the fourth word, consider hints related to bookmarked pages or games within the NYT app.
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