A new NYT Strands puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Wednesday's puzzle instead then click here: NYT Strands hints and answers for Wednesday, July 22 (game #871).
Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.
Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.
NYT Strands today (game #872) - hint #1 - today's theme
What is the theme of today's NYT Strands?
• Today's NYT Strands theme is… Hail to the chief petty officer
NYT Strands today (game #872) - hint #2 - clue words
Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.
- LANTERN
- VINE
- TRAIN
- SNAG
- DUNE
- RAVER
NYT Strands today (game #872) - hint #3 - spangram letters
How many letters are in today's spangram?
• Spangram has 9 letters
NYT Strands today (game #872) - hint #4 - spangram position
What are two sides of the board that today's spangram touches?
• First side: top, 3rd column
• Last side: bottom, 4th column
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Strands today (game #872) - the answers
The answers to today's Strands, game #872, are…
- ADMIRAL
- LIEUTENANT
- COMMANDER
- ENSIGN
- RECRUIT
- SPANGRAM: NAVYRANKS
- My rating: Easy
- My score: Perfect
I don’t know much about the military, but I do know that a chief petty officer is something to do with ships.
Armed with this small piece of common knowledge I was able to land a spangram first, seeing NAVYRANKS running down the center of the board.
After this I went for the only ranks I was confident of and found ADMIRAL and the infuriatingly hard to spell and cunningly hidden LIEUTENANT. Landing these two helped ease out the rest of the board as I navigated without any hints — plain sailing, you might say.
Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Wednesday, July 22, game #871)
- QUESTION
- BUZZER
- ANSWER
- BOARD
- WAGER
- CATEGORY
- SPANGRAM: INJEOPARDY
What is NYT Strands?
Strands is the NYT's not-so-new-any-more word game, following Wordle and Connections. It's now a fully fledged member of the NYT's games stable that has been running for a year and which can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
I've got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you're struggling to beat it each day.