NYT Connections #1171 answer & hints: Tuesday, August 25, 2026

Updated: Tuesday, August 25, 2026 · Hints reviewed by Omer Liban · New puzzle daily at midnight US Eastern Time (5am UK). · Puzzle editor: Wyna Liu.

This page has every level of help for the NYT Connections puzzle #1171 of Tuesday, August 25, 2026: 3 spoiler-free hint tiers that narrow things down step by step, followed by the complete answers with explanations — each behind its own tap-to-reveal card.

Stuck on today's Connections? Work through the hint tiers below — each one gives away a little more, so you can get exactly as much help as you want and still keep the win.

New to Connections? The four answer groups are colour-coded by difficulty: 🟡 yellow is the easiest, then 🟢 green, 🔵 blue, and 🟣 purple — the trickiest, usually built on wordplay. The hints below use those colours.

Connections hints (August 25, 2026)

1One word from each group

Yellow (easiest): one of its words is “COSMETIC”.
Green (easy): one of its words is “HYPERSPACE”.
Blue (tricky): one of its words is “GREEN MILE”.
Purple (trickiest, usually wordplay): one of its words is “HARLEM SHAKE”.

2Category hints (no answers)

Yellow (easiest): the theme is “Surface-level”.
Green (easy): the theme is “Sci-fi phenomena”.
Blue (tricky): the theme is “Stephen king film adaptations, with "the"”.
Purple (trickiest, usually wordplay): the theme is “Ending in ice cream orders”.

3One full group revealed

Yellow (easiest) — the connection is “Surface-level”, and its four words are: COSMETIC, ONE-DIMENSIONAL, SKIN-DEEP, SUPERFICIAL.

Connections answers — August 25, 2026 (#1171)

★Today's full Connections answers, explained

Yellow (easiest) — the connection is “Surface-level”. The words: COSMETIC, ONE-DIMENSIONAL, SKIN-DEEP, SUPERFICIAL.
Green (easy) — the connection is “Sci-fi phenomena”. The words: HYPERSPACE, PARALLEL UNIVERSE, TELEPORTATION, TIME WARP.
Blue (tricky) — the connection is “Stephen king film adaptations, with "the"”. The words: GREEN MILE, LONG WALK, RUNNING MAN, SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION.
Purple (trickiest, usually wordplay) — the connection is “Ending in ice cream orders”. The words: HARLEM SHAKE, INSIDE SCOOP, LICKETY-SPLIT, TRAFFIC CONE.

The puzzle, explained

The purple group's brilliance lies in the fact that each phrase ends with a word you'd actually order at an ice cream shop: HARLEM SHAKE (vanilla shake), INSIDE SCOOP (scoop of ice cream), LICKETY-SPLIT (split banana), and TRAFFIC CONE (cone). The trickiest bait was definitely LICKETY-SPLIT, which screams "fast movement" and could've easily pulled you toward thinking it belonged with TIME WARP or other sci-fi concepts. INSIDE SCOOP was another sneaky one since it's commonly used as an idiom meaning "secret information," which might have made you second-guess whether it was actually about ice cream or belonged with the surface-level group. Once you caught onto the ice cream angle though, it all clicked into place in the most satisfying way.

Next in today's routine: Wordle → · every game's answers on one page. New puzzle daily at midnight US Eastern Time (5am UK). Bookmark this page for tomorrow's hints. Or play Connections on the official site.

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Connections — common questions

What time does NYT Connections reset?

A new Connections puzzle is released daily at midnight US Eastern Time — that's 5am in the UK (4am during US daylight-saving transitions) and 12:00am for US East Coast players.

What do the Connections colours mean?

Yellow is the easiest group, then green, then blue, and purple is the trickiest — purple usually involves wordplay such as homophones, hidden words or 'words before/after X'.

How many mistakes are allowed in Connections?

You can make four mistakes before the puzzle ends. If you see 'one away…', exactly three of your four selected words belong together.

Previous Connections puzzles

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