Strands
Looking for Saturday’s Strands hints, spangram and answers? You can find them here:
Very very hard Strands today, in my opinion, so I am wondering if it took you as long as it took me. So here is some help.
How To Play Strands
The New York Times’ Strands puzzle is a play on the classic word search. It’s in beta for now, which means it’ll only stick around if enough people play it every day.
There’s a new game of Strands to play every day. The game will present you with a six by eight grid of letters. The aim is to find a group of words that have something in common, and you’ll get a clue as to what that theme is. When you find a theme word, it will remain highlighted in blue.
You’ll also need to find a special word called a spangram. This tells you what the words have in common. The spangram links two opposite sides of the board. While the theme words will not be a proper name, the spangram can be a proper name. When you find the spangram, it will remain highlighted in yellow.
Every letter is used once in one of the theme words and spangram. You can connect letters vertically, horizontally and diagonally, and it’s possible to switch directions in the middle of a word. If you’re playing on a touchscreen, double tap the last letter to submit your guess.
If you find three valid words of at least four letters that are not part of the theme, you’ll unlock the Hint button. Clicking this will highlight the letters that make up one of the theme words.
Be warned: You’ll need to be on your toes. Sometimes you’ll need to fill the missing word(s) in a phrase. On other days, the game may revolve around synonyms or homophones. The difficulty will vary from day to day, and the puzzle creators will try to surprise you sometimes.
What Is Today’s Strands Hint?
The official hint will be followed by one I make up myself to push you a long a little. The official hint is:
Start small
And my hint is:
Word in common
What Are Today’s Strands Answers?
Spangram comes first and then the full list of answers after that. The spangram is:
LITTLE
And is found on the board here:
Strands
The full list of answers is:
LEAGUE
DEVIL
RASCALS
DIPPER
SPOON
WOMEN
FOOT
ROCK
Strands
Yeah, this was hard. It was very difficult for me to figure out the connecting thread, so I thought I was just throwing up random words, and I used a lot of hints. Even after the spangram it was still tough. DIPPER took forever and you have to be pretty old to remember Little RASCALS. I am not sure I know the average age of a Strands player, however. Very tough puzzle if you ask me.
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