Skip to main content

NYT Strands today: hints, spangram and answers for Saturday, November 23

Strands is a brand new daily puzzle from the New York Times. A trickier take on the classic word search, you’ll need a keen eye to solve this puzzle.

Like Wordle, Connections, and the Mini Crossword, Strands can be a bit difficult to solve some days. There’s no shame in needing a little help from time to time. If you’re stuck and need to know the answers to today’s Strands puzzle, check out the solved puzzle below.

Recommended Videos

How to play Strands

You start every Strands puzzle with the goal of finding the “theme words” hidden in the grid of letters. Manipulate letters by dragging or tapping to craft words; double-tap the final letter to confirm. If you find the correct word, the letters will be highlighted blue and will no longer be selectable.

If you find a word that isn’t a theme word, it still helps! For every three non-theme words you find that are at least four letters long, you’ll get a hint — the letters of one of the theme words will be revealed and you’ll just have to unscramble it.

Every single letter on the grid is used to spell out the theme words and there is no overlap. Every letter will be used once, and only once.

Each puzzle contains one “spangram,” a special theme word (or words) that describe the puzzle’s theme and touches two opposite sides of the board. When you find the spangram, it will be highlighted yellow.

The goal should be to complete the puzzle quickly without using too many hints.

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s theme is “Did you hear that?”

Here’s a hint that might help you: how things sound.

Today’s Strand answers

NYT Strands logo.
NYT

Today’s spanagram

We’ll start by giving you the spangram, which might help you figure out the theme and solve the rest of the puzzle on your own:

  • SOUNDEFFECTS

Today’s Strands answers

  • CRUNCH
  • BANG
  • JINGLE
  • KAPOW
  • HONK
  • SIZZLE
  • CRASH
Sam Hill
As Digital Trends' Gaming evergreen lead, Sam Hill is here to help you find your new favorite game and dive right in. The…
RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic will bring PC nostalgia to Nintendo Switch
A very long white rollercoaster going from one edge of the image to another.

RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic has been on mobile and Steam for many years, and it's finally coming to Nintendo Switch this December, Atari announced Thursday. It's available for preorder now on the eShop for $25.

Classic is actually a remastered bundle of the first two RollerCoaster Tycoon games and the three expansion packs: Toolkit, Wacky Worlds, and Time Twister, created by Chris Sawyer. The first debuted in 1999, and it set the standard for some of our favorite management sims. The series has staying power, too, although a lot of the recent entries have all been on mobile, especially for iOS. Atari released RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic, which was made in conjunction with Sawyer, for iOS and Android in 2016, and on Steam in 2017. And by all accounts, despite its age, Classic is absolutely worth the time.

Read more
Valve takes stern stance on season passes and DLC in new guidelines
The Steam Deck OLED on a pink background.

Valve is taking a stance against season passes on Steam, implementing new guidelines for developers that'll force them to be clearer about what's in season passes and offer refunds if those plans change.

"If you aren't ready to clearly communicate about the content included in each DLC AND when each DLC will be ready for launch, you shouldn't offer a Season Pass on Steam," Valve wrote in the documentation.

Read more
There’s a horrific beauty in Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl’s bugs
A mutant with a split jaw screams in Stalker 2.

I was still getting my bearings in Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl as I searched an abandoned building in the dead of night. Using my pitifully dim flashlight to scan the faded walls and floors, I hit a dead end and turned to retrace my steps back outside and onto the critical path. That's when I saw something curious: A box was falling from nowhere in particular to the ground. I noted that the room was littered with boxes and other refuse upon entering, but they were all scattered on the floor. Seeing one falling for apparently no reason startled me, but I calmed myself thinking it was a simple physics bug that crops up fairly often in giant open-world games such as this. Stalker 2 already had a reputation for being buggy, after all.

Not five minutes later my expectations flipped on their head when I watched a can lift itself off a table, hover for just a moment as if to mock my previous assumption, and then hurl itself at me and knock out a chunk of my health. That was not a bug despite it appearing exactly like one I had encountered in many games prior. This was an invisible enemy known as a Poltergeist whose invisible nature and method of attack mimicked what a typical bug looked like. Suddenly, I had to question my instincts whenever I came across something unexplainable. I couldn't take anything for granted and that distrust in myself added a new layer of horror.

Read more