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Looking for hints and solutions to today’s NYT Strands puzzle? This comprehensive guide unpacks the challenge with ease. The theme for today is "Moonlighting," and detailed clues and answers are provided below. Save this page for quick access to daily Strands hints and previous solutions.
Spangram Hint: Look for a word that encapsulates the various phases of the moon.
Theme Words Hint: These are terms commonly associated with the different appearances of the moon throughout its cycle.
Spoiler Alert: Answer Ahead!
If one would like to skip the hints and find the solution, read on for the spangram and theme words for today’s Strands puzzle.
The spangram, which encapsulates the puzzle’s theme, is LUNARPHASE.
The words that tie into today’s theme are:
WAXING
WANING
FULL
CRESCENT
GIBBOUS
QUARTER
In today’s Strands puzzle, players navigated through a grid of letters to uncover words aligned with the theme of the moon’s phases. Initial guesses included unrelated words, but the focus quickly shifted to terms like WAXING and WANING, essential to the lunar theme. The word FULL was a key find at the center of the grid, with CRESCENT and GIBBOUS discovered elsewhere. The unifying spangram, LUNARPHASE, tied all the words together, completing the puzzle.
Strands, available on the New York Times website and the NYT Games app, offers a blend of crossword and word search gameplay. Players begin with a letter-filled board and a clue hinting at the theme. The goal is to uncover hidden words, with the spangram—spanning the entire board—serving as the central element that ties the theme together.
Words can be formed in any direction—up, down, left, right, or diagonally—and each letter can be used only once. Discovering the spangram often makes it easier to identify the remaining theme words.
If stuck, submitting non-theme words (four letters or more) unlocks hints. Three valid submissions highlight a theme word on the board. Players then connect the highlighted letters in the correct order to solve it.
Unlike typical puzzle games with strict time limits, Strands allows unlimited guesses until all theme words and the spangram are identified. Successfully completing the puzzle earns a shareable outcome card, showcasing the player’s progress.
Today’s theme revolved around lunar terminology, with LUNARPHASE and related words like WAXING, WANING, FULL, CRESCENT, and GIBBOUS providing an engaging challenge. Solving the puzzle not only brought players closer to mastering Strands but also offered an enlightening dive into the language of the moon.
