Today’s NYT Strands hints and answers.
New York Times
Looking for Thursday’s Strands hints, spangram and answers? You can find them here:
ForbesNYT ‘Strands’ Hints And Answers For Thursday, December 12By Kris HoltHey there! This is my last day of Strands coverage for now. I’ll be back with you in a couple of weeks. Until then, I hope you have a great holiday season!
Today’s NYT Strands hints, spangram and answers for Friday, December 13 are coming right up.
How To Play Strands
The New York Times’ Strands puzzle is a play on the classic word search. It’s available on the NYT website and in the NYT Games app alongside the likes of Wordle and Connections (which we also cover in daily guides on Forbes Games).
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 at least two sides of the board, but it may not start or end there. 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?
Scroll slowly! Just after the hint for today’s Strands puzzle, I’ll reveal what the answer words are.
The official theme hint for today’s Strand puzzle is…
One for the Swifties
Need some extra help? Here’s another hint…
Records from a record-breaking artist
There are six theme words to find today, including the spangram.
What Are Today’s NYT Strands Hints?
Spoiler alert! Don’t scroll any further down the page until you’re ready to find out today’s Strands hints.
Here are the first two letters of every theme word in today’s puzzle. They’re ordered from left to right, then top to bottom by any letter of the word appearing for the first time:
What Are Today’s NYT Strands Answers?
Before I reveal the other the full word list, I’ll first tell you the spangram and show you where that is on the grid.
This is your final spoiler warning!
Today’s Strands spangram is…
ALBUM TITLE
Here’s where you’ll find it on the grid…
New York Times Strands screenshot, showing the highlighted term ALBUM TITLE
New York Times
Today’s Strands theme words are…
- FOLKLORE
- FEARLESS
- ALBUM TITLE
- EVERMORE
- LOVER
- MIDNIGHTS
Here’s what the completed grid looks like…
Completed Strands grid for December 13 featuring the words FOLKLORE, FEARLESS, ALBUM TITLE, … [+] EVERMORE, LOVER and MIDNIGHTS
New York Times
There wasn’t much of a cryptic theme clue to parse out here. Everything was clearly going to be related to Taylor Swift. Swifties, her fans, will be very aware that it’s Swift’s birthday today. The fact I didn’t have to look that up might tell you something about me.
Anyway, I found LOVER and MIDNIGHTS right away, then saw “album.” It only took a second to find the spangram from there. Clean up from there was pretty easy.
I used zero hints and the spangram was the third theme word I found.
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