NYT Connections Puzzle for May 1, 2025: Hints and answers

The New York Times Connections puzzle has become a popular daily word game that helps users improve their vocabulary. Created by Wyna Liu, associate puzzle editor at The New York Times, the game challenges players to find hidden connections among 16 random words and group them into four categories.

About NYT Connections

Launched on June 12, 2023, as part of a beta test, NYT Connections has since become the second-most-played game on the platform, following Wordle. The puzzle game offers a fun way to test your language skills with three levels of difficulty—Easy, Medium, and Hard. It’s an enjoyable way to challenge your brain and expand your vocabulary.

Hints for Today’s Puzzle

Here are some helpful hints for today’s Connections puzzle:

Yellow Category: Things you can win or receive as a prize.

Green Category: Verbs that mean to quit something, like smoking or drinking.

Blue Category: Movements or actions performed with a camera.

Purple Category: Descriptors often used before “-size” to indicate something compact.

Categories for May 1, 2025

Yellow: WINNINGS

Green: STOP, AS A HABIT

Blue: MOVIE CAMERA VERBS

Purple: WORDS THAT PRECEDE “-SIZE” TO MEAN SMALL

Answers for May 1, 2025

Here are the answers to today’s puzzle:

WINNINGS: Pot, Prize, Purse, Reward

STOP, AS A HABIT: Break, Drop, Kick, Shake

MOVIE CAMERA VERBS: Dolly, Pan, Tilt, Zoom

WORDS THAT PRECEDE “-SIZE” TO MEAN SMALL: Bite, Fun, Pocket, Travel

How to Play NYT Connections

The game presents a grid of 16 words, and your goal is to find connections between them and arrange them into four groups. To solve the puzzle, consider synonyms, antonyms, word families, and other word associations. If you're stuck, you can use helpful hints provided in the game.

A new puzzle is available every day at midnight, and you can play on the NYT website or app. Each puzzle offers only one correct solution, so you’ll need to pay attention to words that might belong in multiple categories. The puzzle's difficulty increases with each category, with yellow being the easiest, blue and green more moderate, and purple often requiring more wordplay.

Be careful—if you make four mistakes, the game ends. But if you’re on the right track, the game will guide you with messages indicating how close you are to completing a category.

Play today’s puzzle and share your progress with friends or challenge others to see who can crack the most puzzles!