NYT Connections hint (Sun, 17 May)

Looking for some Connections hints to help with today's puzzle on Sunday, 17th May? It might be the sacred day of rest, but the NYT never rests! That means your streak is still at risk.

If you've had enough of using your brain for the week and just want to kick back and relax, we're here to do the heavy lifting for you in today's Connections puzzle.

How to play Connections

Connections is one of the most popular (and challenging) daily puzzle games published by the New York Times (owners of Wordle). The aim of Connections is to group the 16 words of the day into four groups, where each group of four words has a common theme.

For instance, the words "Hook", "Nana", "Peter", and "Wendy" are all Peter Pan characters. Or to take another example, "Action", "Ballpark", "Go", and "Stick" are all words which commonly come just before the word "Figure". These are the kinds of Connections you'll need to make to solve the puzzle.

Your job is to figure out what these themes are that connect the various words together - but be wary, because a lot of the time there are deceptive red herring connections placed purely to throw you off! To win the game, you have to find all four Connections without making 4 mistakes. On your fourth mistake, the game is over and the answer is revealed automatically.

Each of the four groups in each day's Connections puzzle is also assigned a different colour, which represents how easy or difficult the Connection is to find. These colours are: Yellow (Easiest), Green (Easy), Blue (Medium), and Purple (Hardest).

Click here to play today's Connections puzzle!

Connections hint: Today's Connections words

Below you'll find various hints for today's Connections. Each of the below hints will make it progressively easier for you to solve today's puzzle. First we'll reveal the words in today's Connections, followed by our Connections hint for each group. Then we'll reveal one word inside each group, followed by the groups themselves; and finally, at the bottom of this page, we'll reveal the answers to today's Connections puzzle. Here are the 16 Connections words for today:

• BOIL
• DUCT
• FLEECE
• GRADE
• GRAMMAR
• HIGH
• HOSE
• LINE
• MAIN
• PIPE
• POUR
• PRIMARY
• SQUEEZE
• STEEP
• STIFF
• STRAIN

Connections hint for Sunday 17th May

Here are your Connections hints for today:

• Yellow hint: Something flows through it.
• Green hint: Take advantage of.
• Blue hint: Just add water!
• Purple hint: All share a common second word.
• Extra hint 1: One set forms familiar compounds.
• Extra hint 2: Every group has at least one word containing the letter 'E'

If you need a bit more help, tap the spoiler text below to reveal one word belonging to each group:

• Yellow: Duct
• Green: Squeeze
• Blue: Strain
• Purple: High

Spoiler warning! Today's Connections groups are revealed just below!

Connections hints: All of today's Connections groups

If you need an even bigger clue to figure out today's Connections puzzle, below we'll reveal the four correct Connections groups - the themes which link together each set of four words in the Connections grid.

Here are the Connections groups for today:

• Yellow: Conduit
• Green: Swindle
• Blue: Tea-Making Verbs
• Purple: 'School' Modifiers

Now that you know the themes for the various different Connections in today's puzzle, see if you can solve it! If not, check below for the full answer.

Spoiler warning! Today's Connections answer lies ahead!

Connections answer today

Here is the answer to today's Connections puzzle on Sunday, 17th May:

• Yellow: Conduit (Duct, Line, Main, Pipe)
• Green: Swindle (Fleece, Hose, Squeeze, Stiff)
• Blue: Tea-Making Verbs (Boil, Pour, Steep, Strain)
• Purple: 'School' Modifiers (Grade, Grammar, High, Primary)

Well, well, well! If it isn't a rare purple group that didn't trip me up today. Purple is generally considered the hardest group of them all, but not this time! For me, anyway. I credit that to the fact that I was more familiar with the context, though, rather than me suddenly becoming too smart for Connections.

Congratulations if you got today's Connections answer right, with or without the help of our handy hints above! And if you didn't succeed today, don't worry - a new Connections puzzle is released every day at midnight, so you can try again tomorrow, just like with Wordle!