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A game being played on a smartphone.

Today's NYT Strands hints are easy if you love chaos.

Strands, the New York Times' elevated word-search game, requires the player to perform a twist on the classic word search. Words can be made from linked letters — up, down, left, right, or diagonal, but words can also change direction, resulting in quirky shapes and patterns. Every single letter in the grid will be part of an answer. There's



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Connections game on a smartphone

The NYT Connections puzzle today is not too difficult to solve if you're stylish.

Connections is the one of the most popular New York Times word games that's captured the public's attention. The game is all about finding the "common threads between words." And just like Wordle, Connections resets after midnight and each new set of words gets trickier and trickier—so we've served up some hints and


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A phone with the Pips logo.

Welcome to your guide to Pips, the latest game in the New York Times catalogue.

Released in August 2025, the Pips puts a unique spin on dominoes, creating a fun single-player experience that could become your next daily gaming habit.

Currently, if you're stuck, the game only offers to reveal the entire puzzle, forcing you to move onto the next difficulty level and start over. However, we have you



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Josh O'Connor and Daniel Craig in

Million-dollar diamonds, priests with neck tattoos, full-on resurrection... These are all elements of the narrative puzzle Rian Johnson pieces together in Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery.

The latest Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) whodunnit transports audiences to the quiet town of Chimney Rock, where local church Our Lady of Perpetual Fortitude has been rocked by a murder most foul, that of



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Sam Altman looks down in front of a gold curtain and a round light

It's hard to imagine a company appearing to put its thumb on the scale for another company more than Bob Iger's Disney just did for Sam Altman's OpenAI.

The very day Disney took legal action against Google for what it says is unlicensed use of its intellectual property, it also licensed some of that property for use in Sora, the video generator made by Google's main rival, OpenAI. Just to make it


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Amtrak train
Amtrak managers gave up part of their bonuses for their unionized workers.
  • Over 18,000 unionized Amtrak workers are set to receive a $900 holiday bonus.
  • The Department of Transportation said Amtrak's executives gave up part of their bonuses.
  • The Trump administration has been critical of bonuses previously paid out to Amtrak leadership.

Amtrak is redistributing the wealth this


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screenshots of ios26 appear on colored background

Apple released new updates to its core operating systems today, with the 26.2 versions of iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, and visionOS available now.

As expected, the iPhone update iOS 26.2 is getting the most attention. Apple's official description of the update says it offers "enhancements to Apple Music, Podcasts, and Games, as well as other features, bug fixes, and security updates for your iPhone



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For more than four decades, Hooters has been one of America's most recognizable restaurant chains, famous for its wings, "delightfully tacky" atmosphere, and all-female waitstaff. By the mid-2000s, the chain had its own airline, casino, and calendar, and it operated hundreds of locations around the world.

But what most people don't realize is that, from almost the beginning, Hooters wasn't one


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screenshot of google disco ai tool

Google is always introducing new experimental AI tools, like that time it tried out AI-generated podcasts in Google Search results. Another such AI-powered experiment has hit the proverbial airwaves. This time, it’s a Gemini-powered tool that it’s calling "Disco," which can take a web browser tab and turn it into an interactive web app. 

The process is fairly simple. You take a browser tab and ask


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The Ron Howard movie turns 25 this year, and its star recalls the torture he went through to portray Dr. Seuss' Christmas-loathing character.