Waking up and opening the New York Times Games app usually feels like a gentle mental stretch. On April 16, it felt more like a logic-based ambush. If you’re here, it’s probably because you hit a wall or barely escaped a "Game Over" screen. Look, we’ve all been there. You see four words that seem to belong together, you click them, and the board shakes its head at you. It’s frustrating.
The Connections answers April 16 were a masterclass in what Wyna Liu, the puzzle's editor, does best: linguistic misdirection. She loves to play with "overlap." That's when a word could easily fit into three different categories, and your job isn't just to find a connection, but to find the only connection that leaves the other twelve words functional.
The Actual Connections Answers April 16
Let’s stop dancing around it. You want the results. On this specific Tuesday, the grid was a sneaky mix of synonyms and specific cultural niches.
The Yellow Category—usually the most straightforward—was "Kinds of Footwear." The words were FLAT, MULE, PUMP, and SLIDE. Honestly, if you aren't into fashion, "Mule" might have tripped you up. Most people think of the animal first, but in the shoe world, it's just a backless slip-on.
The Green Category moved into the realm of "Kinds of Grass." This one was relatively fair, featuring BENT, BLUE, CRAB, and RYE. If you’ve ever obsessed over a lawn or watched a golf tournament, these jumped out. If not, "Bent" probably looked like a verb, not a species of turf.
Then things got weird.
The Blue Category focused on "Words Before 'Nut'." The answers were BUTTER, COCO, GROUND, and WAL. This is a classic NYT trope. They take a prefix or a suffix and hide it. You’re looking at "Wal" thinking it’s a typo or part of "Wall," but it’s just the first half of Walnut.
Finally, the Purple Category. This is the one that ruins win streaks. The theme was "Words that Start with Greek Letters." The words were ALPHABET, BETRAY, DELTA, and LAMBDA.
Wait. Did you see it?
ALPHABET (Alpha), BETRAY (Beta), DELTA (Delta), and LAMBDA (Lambda). It’s clever. It’s also mean. Most players find Purple by default—meaning they solve the other three and just click the remaining four words while holding their breath.
Why Today’s Grid Was So Hard
The overlap was the real killer. Look at "Slide." You might have tried to pair it with "Blue" or "Bent" thinking about playground equipment or physical movements. "Mule" is a shoe, but it's also an animal. "Crab" is a grass, but it's also a seafood or a grumpy person.
This is the "Red Herring" strategy.
The New York Times doesn't just give you 16 random words. They give you 16 words that suggest five or six potential categories. The game isn't just about grouping; it's about elimination. For example, if you put "Slide" in a category about "Playground Equipment," you’ll never find a fourth word to match it, and you’ll waste a life.
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Breaking Down the Categories
Let’s get into the weeds.
Yellow: Footwear
This was the "easy" one, but it required a bit of specific knowledge. Most people know what a pump or a flat is. However, "Slide" and "Mule" are slightly more specific. A slide is basically a flip-flop without the toe post. A mule is a loafer without a heel. If you were thinking about actions—like "to slide" or "to pump" (like a bike pump)—you likely got stuck here for a minute.
Green: Grasses
If you live in the suburbs, you might have seen "Crab" and "Rye" and immediately thought of your yard. "Blue" refers to Kentucky Bluegrass. "Bent" refers to Bentgrass, which is that super-short, carpet-like grass you see on putting greens. If you aren't a golfer or a landscaper, "Bent" was almost certainly the word that broke your brain in this set.
Blue: ____ Nut
This is where the puzzle gets "meta." You aren't looking at what the words are, you're looking at what they do.
- Butternut: A squash, but also a nut.
- Coconut: Self-explanatory.
- Groundnut: Another name for a peanut.
- Walnut: The classic.
The trick here was "Wal." It isn't a word on its own in most contexts. When you see a three-letter string like that, your "NYT Puzzle Brain" should immediately start looking for prefixes.
Purple: Greek Letter Starts
This is peak Wyna Liu.
- Alpha-bet
- Beta-ray (or Betray)
- Delta
- Lambda
"Delta" and "Lambda" are just the letters themselves. "Alphabet" and "Betray" hide the letters within the word structure. It's an inconsistent grouping, which is exactly why it's the Purple category. It doesn't follow a perfect internal logic other than the phonetic or spelling-based pun.
How to Win at Connections Every Day
If the Connections answers April 16 taught us anything, it’s that you cannot rush the first click.
People who win consistently do something specific: they find two or three groups before they click a single word. If you see "Pump" and "Mule," don't click yet. Look for more. If you find "Slide" and "Flat," okay, now you have a group. But wait—could "Slide" go somewhere else?
Always look for the "Fifth Word." If you find five words that fit a category, you know that category is a trap. You have to figure out which of those five belongs somewhere else.
The "Submit" Trap
The game allows four mistakes. Use them, but don't waste them on guesses. If you are down to your last life and you have eight words left, stop. Walk away. Get a coffee. When you come back, your brain will often see the "Wal" in Walnut or the "Alpha" in Alphabet without you even trying.
Connections is a game of pattern recognition, but it's also a game of ego. We want to solve it in ten seconds. The puzzle is designed to punish that impulse.
Semantic Overlap: The Secret Sauce
The reason Connections is more popular than Wordle for many people is the "Aha!" moment. In Wordle, you're just hunting for letters. In Connections, you're hunting for how humans categorize the world.
Think about the word "Blue" from the April 16 puzzle.
It could be:
- A color.
- A feeling (sad).
- A type of cheese (Blue cheese).
- A type of grass (Kentucky Bluegrass).
- A movie rating (Adult).
The game designers know you’ll see "Blue" and immediately look for "Red" or "Green." When they don't provide other colors, they force you to shift your perspective. That shift—from "Color" to "Grass"—is the entire point of the game.
Actionable Strategy for Your Next Game
Stop clicking as soon as you see a pair. It’s a trap.
Instead, try this:
- Write the words down. Sometimes seeing them in your own handwriting breaks the visual association the NYT grid creates.
- Check for "hidden" words. Look for words that could be part of a compound word (like "Nut" or "Fire" or "Ball").
- Identify the "weird" word. In the April 16 puzzle, "Wal" was the weirdest word. It didn't fit anything. That usually means it's part of a "Words that start with..." or "Words that end with..." category. Solve the weird word first, and the rest of the board usually collapses into place.
- Say the words out loud. Sometimes the sound of the word triggers a connection that the spelling doesn't. "Beta-ray" sounds like "Betray." You won't see that just by staring.
Tomorrow will be another grid, and it will probably be just as annoying. But if you remember that the puzzle is trying to lie to you, you’re already halfway to winning. Don't let the red herrings win.
Take your time. The grid isn't going anywhere.
Check the categories one last time before you commit to your final four. If you’ve got "Alphabet" and "Betray" left over, and you can’t figure out why—just remember the Greeks. They’re usually hiding in the Purple category.