Looking for today's Connections answers? The Connections answers on January 27 for puzzle #230 are easier than yesterday, with the Connections Companion rating this puzzle's difficulty at 2.6 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, #229, in case you're reading this in a different time zone.
Spoilers lie ahead for Connections #230. 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: Ouch!
- 🟩 Green: Supervise
- 🟦 Blue: Follow the yellow brick road
- 🟪 Purple: Two wrongs don't make a wright
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.
Alright then, here's a larger hint: Today's Connections answers contain a smattering of body parts and human traits, but don't group them together. Instead, avoid too much pain by considering a famous movie that begins in windy Kansas.
Today's Connections answers
So, what are today's Connections answers for game #230?
Drumroll, please...
- 🟨 Hurt: Ache, burn, smart, sting
- 🟩 Look after: Guard, mind, tend, watch
- 🟦 Sought after in "The Wizard of Oz": Brain, courage, heart, home
- 🟪 Silent "W": Answer, two, wrist, wrong
Smart, Courage, Heart... some of today's Connections answers could pass for the character traits one might list to impress on a dating app. But then Ache, Burn, and Sting could also describe the emotions some encounter after using one. Unable to find a fourth word for my first theory, it appeared to fit nicely with my second. Yellow category, Hurt, duly complete!
Next up, Guard (dog) and Watch (dog) had me considering our trusty canine companions, but after deciding that no pet owner would ever describe themselves as having a 'Home' dog, I wisely moved on. Mind and Tend would instead complete the green category.
A tactical hit of the shuffle button initiated a cyclone that threw Brain and Courage next to each other, and I was instantly thrown into Oz alongside a Scarecrow and a cowardly Lion. Heart and (there's no place like) Home followed for the blue category.
Answer, two, wrist and wrong remained, and the combination of wrong and answer brought back memories of failed school spelling bees. Which appeared particularly apt, given the theme of the purple category: silent Ws. Cue a wry smile as I hit submit following a successful wrestle with today’s Connections answers!
Yesterday's Connections answers
Reading this in a later time zone? Here are the Connections answers for game #229, which had a difficulty rating of 3.6 out of 5, according to the Connections Companion.
I enjoyed the rare privilege of resolving the trickier purple category first today, grateful to a childhood watching hours of Looney Tunes re-runs. For me, the word Bugs could only ever be followed by 'bunny', and so I could have been nonchalantly chomping on a carrot as I hopped to complete the category with Bad, Dust, and Honey.
Glove, Sock, Top Hat, and Boot forced me to consider a sartorial connection here, but, thankfully, I took a beat before submitting this foursome as an answer. That's because I also spotted the words Strike and Bat, leading me towards a baseball theme that could also therefore include Glove.
- 🟨 Baseball equipment: Ball, base, bat, glove
- 🟩 Hard hit: Blow, lick, sock, strike
- 🟦 Original Monopoly tokens: Boot, iron, thimble, top hat
- 🟪 ______ bunny: Bad, bugs, dust, honey
Despite my informed reticence, I still managed to lose my first life, entering Bat, Base, Glove, and Strike to find that I was only one away. Thankfully, like baseball, Connections offers several chances before a strikeout, and so I honed in specifically on equipment, adding Ball in place of Strike to complete the yellow category.
I then went from one famous American pastime to another, as the seemingly random items of Iron and Thimble made a lot more sense when combined with the aforementioned Boot and Top Hat. They are, of course, original Monopoly tokens.
That left Blow, Lick, Sock, and Strike, which sound like terms straight from Norman Mailer's The Fight, as synonyms for a hard hit. With today's Connections complete, I'm pleased to report that there was no strikeout, or indeed knockout, for me today!
