If you’re looking for the Connections answer for Friday, October 13, 2023, read on—I’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solutions to all four categories. Beware, there are spoilers below for October 13, NYT Connections #124! Read on if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Connections game.
If you want an easy way to come back to our Connections hints every day, bookmark this page. You can also find our past hints there as well, in case you want to know what you missed in a previous puzzle.
Below, I’ll give you some oblique hints at today’s Connections answers. And further down the page, I’ll reveal the themes and the answers. Scroll slowly and take just the hints you need!
Does today’s Connections game require any special knowledge?
There are some musical artists in here, and some place names. There’s also a category that foodies might get more easily than the rest of us. Still, nothing too obscure.
Here are some definitions of lesser-known words in today’s puzzle:
LAGOS is the largest city in Nigeria, and one of the world’s largest cities, with a metro area population of 21 million, similar to New York City.
FAVA is a type of bean, also called broad beans. (The word “fava” comes from the Latin for bean, so the FAVA bean is the bean bean.)
Hints for the themes in today’s Connections puzzle
Here are some spoiler-free hints for the groupings in today’s Connections:
Yellow category - The musical fruit.
Green category - A library of locations.
Blue category - Hope you paid attention in English class.
Purple category - A rare case where one of the words also describes the category!
Does today’s Connections game involve any wordplay?
No, but there are a lot of ambiguous terms! Just the usual kind of trickiness.
Ready to hear the answers? Keep scrolling if you want a little more help.
BEWARE: Spoilers follow for today’s Connections puzzle!
We’re about to give away some of the answers. Scroll slowly if you don’t want the whole thing spoiled. (The full solution is a bit further down.)
What are the ambiguous words in today’s Connections?
A LIMERICK can be a kind of poetry (with a particular RHYME scheme and METER) but today you’ll want to think of the city in Ireland.
LIMA can be the capital of Peru, or a type of bean supposedly disliked by children. Our food editor Claire Lower says that, no, it is the children who are wrong:
When cooked correctly, they have a velvety, almost creamy texture and nutty, savory flavor. Undercooked lima beans, however, are terrible. They’re mealy, nearly chalky, and not at all fun to eat. Judging by what I have been served in many restaurants, I think that the vast majority of lima bean haters have never had fully cooked lima beans.
A PINTO can be a horse, so named because it is “painted” (that’s the word in Spanish) with large spots. Or it can be a bean that has brownish streaks when raw, and a smooth color when cooked. Or the Ford PINTO, little brother to the Mustang, a car whose gas tank placement allegedly made the car prone to bursting into flames during collisions.
The DUDE is a character in The Big Lebowski, and the term derives from the older sense of a well dressed man (hence “DUDE ranch,” a place for tourists to play cowboy; the word may derive from the “doodle” in Yankee Doodle). That said, if we’re looking at RAPPERs today, you should also know that Devin the DUDE is a major figure in stoner rap.
What are the categories in today’s Connections?
Yellow: BEANS
Green: CITIES BEGINNING WITH “L”
Blue: POETRY TERMS
Purple: “THE(E) ____” RAPPERS
DOUBLE BEWARE: THE SOLUTION IS BELOW
Ready to learn the answers to today’s Connections puzzle? I give them all away below.
What are the yellow words in today’s Connections?
The yellow grouping is considered to be the most straightforward. The theme for today’s yellow group is BEANS and the words are: FAVA, KIDNEY, LIMA, PINTO.
What are the green words in today’s Connections?
The green grouping is supposed to be the second-easiest. The theme for today’s green category is CITIES BEGINNING WITH “L” and the words are: LAGOS, LIMERICK, LINCOLN, LUXOR.
What are the blue words in today’s Connections?
The blue grouping is the second-hardest. The theme for today’s blue category is POETRY TERMS and the words are: LINE, METER, RHYME, VERSE
What are the purple words in today’s Connections?
The purple grouping is considered to be the hardest. The theme for today’s purple category is “THE(E) ____” RAPPERS and the words are: CREATOR, DUDE, RAPPER, STALLION.
How I solved today’s Connections
PINTO and LINCOLN are both cars; PINTO and STALLION are both horses. But PINTO, FAVA, LIMA, and KIDNEY are all beans. 🟨
VERSE, RHYME, LINE, and METER are all elements of poetry, and I put them together instead of giving in to the temptation of thinking of how they are employed in LIMERICKs or by RAPPERs. 🟦
LUXOR, LIMERICK, LAGOS, and LINCOLN are all place names starting with L. 🟩
Megan Thee STALLION is a RAPPER, and a lot of rappers are DUDEs, but I still wasn’t sure what the connection was among these last few words. I submitted the grouping and then felt very silly to realize I almost had it—besides Meg there’s Chance the RAPPER, Devin the DUDE, Tyler the CREATOR. 🟪
Connections Puzzle #124 🟨🟨🟨🟨 🟦🟦🟦🟦 🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟪🟪🟪🟪
How to play Connections
I have a full guide to playing Connections, but here’s a refresher on the rules:
First, find the Connections game either on the New York Times website or in their Crossword app. You’ll see a game board with 16 tiles, each with one word or phrase. Your job is to select a group of four tiles that have something in common. Often they are all the same type of thing (for example: RAIN, SLEET, HAIL, and SNOW are all types of wet weather) but sometimes there is wordplay involved (for example, BUCKET, GUEST, TOP TEN, and WISH are all types of lists: bucket list, guest list, and so on).
Select four items and hit the Submit button. If you guessed correctly, the category and color will be revealed. (Yellow is easiest, followed by green, then blue, then purple.) If your guess was incorrect, you’ll get a chance to try again.
You win when you’ve correctly identified all four groups. But if you make four mistakes before you finish, the game ends and the answers are revealed.
How to win Connections
The most important thing to know to win Connections is that the groupings are designed to be tricky. Expect to see overlapping groups. For example, one puzzle seemed to include six breakfast foods: BACON, EGG, PANCAKE, OMELET, WAFFLE, and CEREAL. But BACON turned out to be part of a group of painters along with CLOSE, MUNCH, and WHISTLER, and EGG was in a group of things that come by the dozen (along with JUROR, ROSE, and MONTH). So don’t hit “submit” until you’ve confirmed that your group of four contains only those four things.
If you’re stuck, another strategy is to look at the words that seem to have no connection to the others. If all that comes to mind when you see WHISTLER is the painting nicknamed “Whistler’s Mother,” you might be on to something. When I solved that one, I ended up googling whether there was a painter named Close, because Close didn’t fit any of the obvious themes, either.
Another way to win when you’re stuck is, obviously, to read a few helpful hints–which is why we share these pointers every day. Check back tomorrow for the next puzzle!