NYT Connections today hints and answers for Saturday, October 24 #1,231

NYTimes Connections
(Image credit: Future)

Today's puzzle wants to go to the bar to avoid the ads.

Find our guide to New York Times Connections answers and hints for October 24 below.

Spoilers lie ahead for Connections #1,231. Only read on if you want to know today's Connections answers.

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Plus, we're including a reflection on yesterday's puzzle, #1,230, in case you're reading this in a different time zone.

Alternatively, visit our how to play NYT Connections guide for tips on how to solve the puzzle without our help.

What is Connections

Solving Connections relies on identifying connecting categories among 16 words. Each category's difficulty level is represented by a color; yellow is the easiest grouping, and purple is the most challenging. Once you've made 4 mistakes in your guesses, the answers will be revealed, so hints can be helpful.

Every day, we update this article with Connections hints and tips to help you find all 4 of today's answers so you can keep your Connections streak going. And if the clues aren't enough, you'll find all four answers below, with the category titles and the correlating words.

Today's Connections answer — hints to help you solve it

Today's Connection Grid and Words

The New York Times Connections puzzle unsolved on Saturday, October 24, 2026

(Image credit: New York Times)
  • Comic
  • Salad
  • Bacon
  • Sparkler
  • Popsicle
  • Pop-up
  • Candy
  • Hobby Horse
  • Banner
  • Pinwheel
  • Space
  • Film
  • Interstitial
  • Sports
  • Mobius
  • Overlay

We have the Connections categories below, but here's a hint without the actual titles. Try this out:

  • 🟨 Yellow: Stripe
  • 🟩 Green: Stick
  • 🟦 Blue: Annoying
  • 🟪 Purple: Food and drink

Today's Connections Group Hints

If you need hints to solve the groupings, then here are the themes of each, based on the order of difficulty:

  • 🟨 Yellow: Kinds of strips
  • 🟩 Green: Things on sticks
  • 🟦 Blue: Online ad formats
  • 🟪 Purple: ____ Bar

These hints should get you at least some of the way towards finding today's Connections answers. If not, then you can read on for bigger clues; or, if you just want to know the answer, then scroll down further.

Today's Connections answers

The Connections answers on October 24 for puzzle #1,231 are a bit harder than yesterday's puzzle, with the Connections Companion rating this puzzle's difficulty at 2.3 out of 5.

  • 🟨 Kinds of strips: Bacon, comic, film, mobius
  • 🟩 Things on sticks: Hobby horse, pinwheel, popsicle, spakler
  • 🟦 Online ad formats: Banner, interstitial, overlay, pop-up
  • 🟪 ____ Bar: Candy, salad, space, sports

The New York Times Connections puzzle solved on Saturday, October 24, 2026

(Image credit: New York Times)

Overlay and pop-up got me going in today's puzzle as I immediately thought website ads. That led to interstitial and banner.

Mobius strip is how I spotted the strips with bacon, comic and film.

It took a moment to accept hobby horse because I was thinking of the idiom and not the physical toy, but I had pinwheel, popsicle and sparkler as stick-based things.

Anyway, that left candy bar, salad bar, space bar and sports bar as my final four. Unfortunately, a connection I never really made today, which seems much easier now that I've seen it.

Yesterday's Connections answers

  • 🟨 Forthright: Direct, frank, open, vocal
  • 🟩 Things you install on a computer: Driver, extension, plugin, update
  • 🟦 Quantities in a formula for power: Distance, force, power, time
  • 🟪 ____ Tap: Double, love, phone, spinal

Reading this in a later time zone? Here are the Connections answers for game #1,230 which had a difficulty rating of 2 out of 5.

Perhaps I'm showing my age, but Spinal is automatically Spinal Tap to to me, and then Love Tap confirmed the set for me; then I just had to hunt down double tap and phone tap.

The PC installations of driver, extension, plugin and update connected with me next, largely because of the word update.

I always find myself annoyed when one of the clues is in the title, but power comboed me with distance, force, and time.

This left the yellow set last with frank, open, vocal and direct.

Scott Younker
West Coast Reporter

Scott Younker is the West Coast Reporter at Tom’s Guide. He covers all the lastest tech news. He’s been involved in tech since 2011 at various outlets and is on an ongoing hunt to build the easiest to use home media system. When not writing about the latest devices, you are more than welcome to discuss board games or disc golf with him. He also handles all the Connections coverage on Tom's Guide and has been playing the addictive NYT game since it released.
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