Today's puzzle is tricky with a surprising number of false groups.
Find our guide to New York Times Connections answers and hints for July 8 below.
Spoilers lie ahead for Connections #1,123. Only read on if you want to know today's Connections answers.
Plus, we're including a reflection on yesterday's puzzle, #1,122, in case you're reading this in a different time zone.
Alternatively, visit our how to play NYT Connections guide for tips on how to solve the puzzle without our help.
What is Connections
Solving Connections relies on identifying connecting categories among 16 words. Each category's difficulty level is represented by a color; yellow is the easiest grouping, and purple is the most challenging. Once you've made 4 mistakes in your guesses, the answers will be revealed, so hints can be helpful.
Every day, we update this article with Connections hints and tips to help you find all 4 of today's answers so you can keep your Connections streak going. And if the clues aren't enough, you'll find all four answers below, with the category titles and the correlating words.
Today's Connections answer — hints to help you solve it
Today's Connection Grid and Words
- Drift
- Plane
- Wax
- Plot
- Pluck
- Cards
- Shave
- Thread
- Grate
- Pick
- Worship
- Tap
- Lords
- Strum
- Theme
- Sliver
We have the Connections categories below, but here's a hint without the actual titles. Try this out:
- 🟨 Yellow: Emsmallen
- 🟩 Green: Story
- 🟦 Blue: Porch sitting
- 🟪 Purple: Abodes
Today's Connections Group Hints
If you need hints to solve the groupings, then here are the themes of each, based on the order of difficulty:
- 🟨 Yellow: Cut into thin pieces
- 🟩 Green: Motif
- 🟦 Blue: Guitar-playing techniques
- 🟪 Purple: House of ____
These hints should get you at least some of the way towards finding today's Connections answers. If not, then you can read on for bigger clues; or, if you just want to know the answer, then scroll down further.
Today's Connections answers
The Connections answers on July 8 for puzzle #1,123 are harder yesterday's puzzle, with the Connections Companion rating this puzzle's difficulty at 2.5 out of 5.
- 🟨 Rooms in Clue: Conservatory, hall, kitchen, study
- 🟩 Student-athlete designations: All-american, jock, letterman, team captain
- 🟦 Acme Products Used by Wile E. Coyote: Earthquake Pills, Iron Bird Seed, Rocket Skates, TNT
- 🟪 Ending in "Sesame Street" characters: Bernie, colbert, discount, san anselmo
I almost struck out today because I saw three different groups today including a woodworking one, eyebrows and a misread of sewing.
Anyhow, my way in was pluck and strum which put me in mind of guitars. That's how I got to tap and pick.
Plot and theme got me on the "motif" theme followed by drift and thread.
I'm not sure why it took until now for House of Lords to lock into place but here's where I saw it. Then House of Worship and Wax followed with Cards as the last pick.
This left grate, plane, shave, and slliver as my final four thin pieces.
Yesterday's Connections answers
- 🟨 Stunning news: Bombshell, revelation, shocker, thunderbolt
- 🟩 Science fair model subjects: Atom, DNA, solar system, volcano
- 🟦 Acme products used by Wile E. Coyote: Earthquake pills, iron bird seed, rocket skates, TNT
- 🟪 Starting with dating apps: Bumblebee, grind rail, matcha, tinderbox
Reading this in a later time zone? Here are the Connections answers for game #1,122, which had a difficulty rating of 2 out of 5.
After yesterday's 5-rated difficulty puzzle, today takes a steep dive in difficulty down to 2. I immediately fell for the talk show host trap for an early strike, so that's on me.
To reset, I took the high school words in jock, letterman, team captain, and all-american.
Sna Anselmo, a town in California, is where I focused next by breaking apart the word to find something. I managed to get Elmo and Ansel out of it. Elmo led me to Bert and Ernie in Bernie and Colbert. It did take a second to click on Count in discount.
The twist wasn't clicking for me, so I took the Clue rooms of hall, kitchen, study, and conservatory next.
Which left the French twist, lemon twist, Oliver twist, and plot twist as my final four.
