Today’s New York Times word games puzzle #1013 is live. This guide walks you through category hints, category names, and the full answers in the exact order that protects your solving experience. Skip to the section you need — or scroll straight to the answers at the bottom.
What Is NYT Connections?
NYT Connections is a daily word-grouping puzzle from The New York Times. Each day, 16 words appear on the board and your job is to sort them into four groups of four. Every group shares a hidden common thread — a category — that links all four words together.
The game was developed with associate puzzle editor Wyna Liu and has become one of the most-played games in the NYT Games catalog. It runs on web browsers and mobile devices, resets at midnight, and lets you share your social media — just like Wordle.
The four groups are color-coded by difficulty. Yellow is the easiest group, green is the next step up, blue is harder, and purple is the most challenging. Words are deliberately chosen to trick you — many will seem to belong to more than one group. That’s the puzzle.
How to Play
- Select four words you believe share a common connection and tap “Submit.”
- If all four are correct, those words are removed from the board and the group is revealed.
- If your guess is wrong, it counts as one mistake. You get four mistakes total before the game ends.
- You can shuffle and rearrange the board at any time to spot patterns more easily.
- Start with the group you’re most confident about — usually yellow — to clear the board and reduce confusion.
Category Hints for March 20, 2026 — No Answers Yet
Not ready for the full reveal? Here are vague one-line clues for each color category:
🟨 Yellow: Something you do when you bother or unsettle someone
🟩 Green: You’d land on these spaces if you were playing a classic board game
🟦 Blue: These figures come from the stories the ancient Greeks told
🟪 Purple: Think of the word that comes after “egg” — these all follow it
Category Names for March 20, 2026
Still working it out? Here are the official category names without any of the words revealed:
🟨 DISTURB
🟩 WORDS ON A MONOPOLY BOARD
🟦 FIGURE IN GREEK MYTH
🟪 EGG ___
Full Answers for Connections #1013 — March 20, 2026
Ready for the complete solution? Here are all four groups:
🟨 DISTURB: ALARM, CONCERN, RATTLE, SHAKE
🟩 WORDS ON A MONOPOLY BOARD: BOARDWALK, CHANCE, LUXURY, PARKING
🟦 FIGURE IN GREEK MYTH: FATE, FURY, MUSE, SIREN
🟪 EGG ___: CARTON, NOODLE, ROLL, TIMER
What Made Today’s Puzzle Tricky
Puzzle #1013 had a few genuine traps worth calling out.
The yellow group (DISTURB) was the most deceptively simple. ALARM, RATTLE, and SHAKE are all common synonyms for disturbing or unsettling someone, but CONCERN feels slightly different in register — it’s more emotional than physical. Players who sorted by “strong, sudden action” may have struggled to place it.
The purple group (EGG ___) was the real curveball. CARTON, NOODLE, ROLL, and TIMER all follow the word “egg” cleanly, but NOODLE reads as a standalone and TIMER could easily drift toward other categories. Players who weren’t thinking in compound-word mode likely lost a guess here.
The blue group (FIGURE IN GREEK MYTH) was straightforward once you saw it — FATE, FURY, MUSE, and SIREN are all figures from Greek mythology. The danger was SIREN, which many players associate more with emergency vehicles or modern-day warnings than with mythological creatures who lured sailors.
CHANCE and LUXURY in the green group (WORDS ON A MONOPOLY BOARD) were the most likely decoys. CHANCE could easily have been sorted under DISTURB, and LUXURY sounds like a generic descriptor. BOARDWALK and PARKING are more recognizable as Monopoly staples and likely anchored most solvers into the right category.
Tips for Solving Today’s Puzzle
These tips are built around today’s actual categories — not generic advice.
Start with the Monopoly group. BOARDWALK and PARKING are unmistakably from the board, which gives you an anchor. Build out from there by asking what other words you’ve seen printed on a Monopoly square.
Think in compound words for purple. “Egg ___” becomes obvious once you test CARTON and TIMER — but the trick is to apply that compound-word lens to all 16 words before guessing. NOODLE and ROLL both pass the “egg ___” test quietly.
Don’t let ALARM drift into Greek myth. It’s tempting to think mythologically about it, but ALARM sits firmly in the DISTURB group. The Greek myth words are all proper nouns or near-proper-noun figures: FATE, FURY, MUSE, SIREN.
Save CONCERN for last if you’re unsure. It’s the least intuitive word in the yellow group. If you’re confident in the other three categories, CONCERN defaults to DISTURB by elimination.
More Daily Puzzle Answers
Looking for help with other puzzles today or this week?
- March 19, 2026 NYT Connections Puzzle #1012 Hints and Answers
- March 18, 2026 NYT Connections Puzzle #1011 Hints and Answers
- March 17, 2026 NYT Connections Puzzle #1010 Hints and Answers
- March 19, 2026 Wordle #1734 Hint and Answer
- Bring a Plate — March 19, 2026 NYT Strands Hints and Answers
- March 19, 2026 NYT Mini Crossword Hints and Answers
Shahid Maqsood is a digital entrepreneur and SEO specialist focused on building engaging web experiences. He is the creator of DotWordle, combining creativity with smart, user-friendly design.
