NYT Connections today hints and answers — Wednesday, January 1 (#570)

NYTimes Connections
(Image credit: Future)

Looking for clues for today's Connections answers? The Connections answers on January 1 for puzzle #570 are similar to yesterday's puzzle, with the Connections Companion rating this puzzle's difficulty at 3 out of 5.

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.

Plus, we're including a reflection on yesterday's puzzle, #569, in case you're reading this in a different time zone.

Spoilers lie ahead for Connections #570. Only read on if you want to know today's Connections answers.

Alternatively, visit our how to play NYT Connections guide for tips on how to solve the puzzle without our help.

Today's Connections answer — hints to help you solve it

Unlike our guide to today's Wordle answer, where we recommend the best Wordle start words as your strategy, 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.

Today's Connections words are: Whale, Cocktail, Finance, Question, Statement, Solution, Grown, Wine, Tech, Command, Compound, Crypto, Mown, Pharma, Exclamation and Mixture.

If you need hints to solve the groupings, then here are the themes of each, based on the order of difficulty:

  • 🟨 Yellow: Slimy Animals
  • 🟩 Green: Things that Luminesce
  • 🟦 Blue: Dutch Symbols
  • 🟪 Purple: Ending with Synonyms for "Plunge"

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.

Here's a larger hint: Don't touch these creatures without gloves, or you might have to shine a light on them. Can you read signs in the Netherlands? If you can't, you might take a plunge.

Today's Connections answers

So, what are today's Connections answers for game #570?

Drumroll, please...

  • 🟨 Slimy Animals: Earthworm, Eel, Salamander, Slug
  • 🟩 Things that Luminesce: Aurora, Firefly, Glowstick, Radium
  • 🟦 Dutch Symbols: Canal, Clog, Tulip, Windmill
  • 🟪 Ending with Synonyms for "Plunge": Gatefish, Raindrop, Skydive, Waterfall

I failed today's puzzle; I'm not afraid to admit it. After quickly getting the yellow and green categories, I hit a wall with blue and purple.

I shuffled and shuffled, and nothing seemed to connect for me. Oh well, there's always tomorrow's puzzle to bring me back to the game! I used the Connections Companion to get one word from each of the two and still couldn't piece it together.

I resorted to guessing and failed miserably, resulting in me using all of my mistakes.

Yesterday's Connections answers

  • 🟨 Move Quickly: Bolt, Dart, Dash, Fly
  • 🟩 Fun time: Ball, Blast, Kick, Thrill
  • 🟦 Words before an addressee: Attention, Dear, For, To
  • 🟪 Name ____: Brand, Drop, Game, Names

Reading this in a later time zone? Here are the Connections answers for game #569, which had a difficulty rating of 3.3 out of 5, according to the Connections Companion.

I found yesterday's puzzle to be exceedingly difficult, but after a few shuffles, I put together the speed element for the yellow clues.

I got a little hung up on the second one, piecing together fun things. I saw Ball, Blast and Thrill, but I'd never considered the word Kick to mean to have a fun time. Luckily, after a mistake, I guessed Kick to lock down the green category.

Left with eight choices and two categories, I had to dig in and get the brain flowing to find connections. After several shuffles, I spotted the connection to ways to start a letter and was correct, leaving only the final four.

Dave LeClair
Senior News Editor

Dave LeClair is the Senior News Editor for Tom's Guide, keeping his finger on the pulse of all things technology. He loves taking the complicated happenings in the tech world and explaining why they matter. Whether Apple is announcing the next big thing in the mobile space or a small startup advancing generative AI, Dave will apply his experience to help you figure out what's happening and why it's relevant to your life.