NYT Connections today hints and answers — Wednesday, September 4 (#451)

NYTimes Connections
(Image credit: Future)

Looking for today's Connections answers? The Connections answers on September 4 for puzzle #451 a skosh easier than yesterday's answers, with the Connections Companion rating this puzzle's difficulty at 2.7 out of 5.

Every day, we update this article with Connections hints and tips to help you find all 4 of today's answers. And if the hints aren't enough, you'll find all 4 answers below, with the category titles and the correlating words. Plus, we're including a reflection on yesterday's puzzle, #450, in case you're reading this in a different time zone.

Spoilers lie ahead for Connections #451. 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.

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

  • 🟨 Yellow: Very small amount
  • 🟩 Green: Puppy purchases
  • 🟦 Blue: Help put on a party
  • 🟪 Purple: Symbols on a keyboard

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: Consider the last word you read, then put on a shindig, before going to the pet store and ending with a shift and a number.

Today's Connections answers

So, what are today's Connections answers for game #451?

Drumroll, please...

  • 🟨 Very small amount: Hint, shred, touch, trace
  • 🟩 Puppy purchases: Bed, bowl, collar, crate
  • 🟦 Help put on a party: Cater, host, plan, throw
  • 🟪 Symbols on a keyboard: Brace, caret, hash, star

Twas a nice little puzzle today. 

We kicked it off with the yellow category snagging hint, shred, touch and trace.

I saw cater early so had throw and host marked early. I didn't consider plan at first but it didn't fit elsewhere, so blue we go.

I did a similar thing with the green category early on where for some reason I didn't consider crate and bed as separate things, so I passed over it as I saw other categories better. Bowl and collar were obvious from there.

Purple became a rote fill with brace, caret, hash and star, or 9(0), 6, 3, and 8. 

Yesterday's Connections answers

Reading this in a later time zone? Here are the Connections answers for game #448, which had a difficulty rating of 3.1 out of 5, according to the Connections Companion.

Today, I found tricky in that I struggled with the yellow and green categories, allegedly the easiest, while quickly knocking out the blue and purple lines.

I almost immediately saw currencies with yen (Japan) and pound (UK) before finding real (Brazil) and rounding it with won (South Korea). If you're stuck with this one and don't know the currencies, the words don't really fit any where else in the grid.

I wasn't looking for it but Knuckle(head) came to mind and the rest of that category clicked with fore(head), block(head). I did take a strike with over(head) but quickly fixed that with arrow(head).

And then I got stuck. I took a couple strikes trying to force a bowling category with save, spare and extra. Having the first two did get me to eventually mark excuse and pardon for the absolve category.

Green then became the rote fill with beyond, extra, over and too. Whew. One strike left.

Scott Younker
West Coast Reporter

Scott Younker is the West Coast Reporter at Tom’s Guide. He covers all the lastest tech news. He’s been involved in tech since 2011 at various outlets and is on an ongoing hunt to build the easiest to use home media system. When not writing about the latest devices, you are more than welcome to discuss board games or disc golf with him.