NYT Strands hints, answers for September 18, 2025

If you’re reading this, you’re looking for a little help playing Strands, the New York Times‘ elevated word-search game.

Strands 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 always a theme linking every solution, along with the “spangram,” a special, word or phrase that sums up that day’s theme, and spans the entire grid horizontally or vertically.

By providing an opaque hint and not providing the word list, Strands creates a brain-teasing game that takes a little longer to play than its other games, like Wordle and Connections.

If you’re feeling stuck or just don’t have 10 or more minutes to figure out today’s puzzle, we’ve got all the NYT Strands hints for today’s puzzle you need to progress at your preferrined pace.

NYT Strands hint for today’s theme: Practice makes perfect

The words are musical terms.

Today’s NYT Strands theme plainly explained

These words are associated with learning how to play an instrument.

NYT Strands spangram hint: Is it vertical or horizontal?

Today’s NYT Strands spangram is veritcal.

NYT Strands spangram answer today

Today’s spangram is Piano Lessons.

NYT Strands word list for September 18

• Scale

• Tune

• Theory

• Recital

• Piano Lessons

• Chord

• Technique

Looking for other daily online games? Mashable’s Games page has more hints, and if you’re looking for more puzzles, Mashable’s got games now!

Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Not the day you’re after? Here’s the solution to yesterday’s Strands.