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NYT Connections #618 is the puzzle from Tuesday, February 18, 2025. Here are spoiler-conscious hints first, followed by the complete groups and explanations—including the British vocabulary behind the purple category.
NYT Connections #618 was published on Tuesday, February 18, 2025. The puzzle’s four groups are CRATER, ACCESSIBLE, SUBSTANTIAL, AS A MEAL, and BRITISHISMS.
Hints for Connections #618
Need help without seeing the complete solution? These clues become progressively more specific.
- Gentlest hint: One group contains words for a depression, opening, or hollow area.
- Second hint: One group describes something that is easy to obtain, reach, or access.
- Third hint: One group describes a satisfying or substantial meal.
- Strongest hint: The remaining four words are informal British terms associated with a sandwich, a chip shop, soccer, and television.
Spoiler warning: The complete answers to Connections #618 appear below.
#1 Best Overall
NYT Connections #618 answers for February 18, 2025
Yellow: CRATER
CAVITY · HOLE · HOLLOW · PIT
Each of these words can describe a depression or empty space in the ground or another surface. A crater is a large, bowl-shaped depression, while a cavity, hole, hollow, or pit can describe a smaller or less specific opening or depression.
Green: ACCESSIBLE
AVAILABLE · HANDY · NEARBY · READY
These words can all suggest that something is accessible, obtainable, or conveniently within reach. Available and ready are the most direct fits. Something handy is conveniently accessible, while something nearby is easy to reach because of its proximity.
Blue: SUBSTANTIAL, AS A MEAL
FILLING · HEARTY · SOLID · SQUARE
Filling, hearty, and solid can describe a satisfying, substantial meal. Square is the trickier entry: in the phrase “a square meal,” it means a proper, nourishing, substantial meal.
Rank #2
Purple: BRITISHISMS
BUTTY · CHIPPY · FOOTY · TELLY
This is the most regionally dependent group in the puzzle. In informal British English, a butty is a sandwich, a chippy is a fish-and-chip shop or chip shop, footy refers to soccer in UK usage, and the telly is the television.
Do these 3 things before closing this tab:
1Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors2Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches3Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsA useful way to remember the four words is to imagine a short British-English sentence: get a butty from the chippy, then watch the footy on the telly. This is simply a solving mnemonic, not an official clue or quotation from the puzzle.
Why the Britishisms group may be difficult
The purple group depends heavily on familiarity with British informal vocabulary. The relevant meanings are not necessarily the first ones that come to mind for American players, particularly for butty and chippy.
Rank #3
There is also an important qualification around footy. In British usage, it commonly means soccer, which is the intended meaning here. In Australian English, however, “footy” can refer to rugby-related football codes. It should therefore not be treated as a universal synonym for soccer in every variety of English.
How to solve this Connections board
The cleanest starting point is CAVITY, HOLE, HOLLOW, PIT. They make a strong semantic cluster around depressions or openings, and removing them eliminates several distractions.
Quick wins for a faster PC:
Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →With those four gone, AVAILABLE, HANDY, NEARBY, READY form a coherent group about access, proximity, or availability. The remaining words are more likely to be food descriptions and British informal terms.
Rank #4
The main trap is SQUARE. On its own, it can suggest a geometric shape or something firm and conventional. In this board, it belongs with FILLING, HEARTY, and SOLID because of the expression “a square meal.” Connections often uses this kind of familiar phrase to make one entry less obvious than the others.
Other words also create tempting overlaps. Ready might describe food that is ready to serve, and solid can describe something physically firm. The objective is not to find any possible association; it is to identify the one shared relationship that accounts for all four entries without forcing the connection.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How difficult was Connections #618?
One contemporary solver described this puzzle as easy and reported a perfect solve, while noting that the Britishisms group was especially approachable for UK players. That is an individual assessment, not an official New York Times difficulty rating. For players unfamiliar with British vocabulary, the purple group may make #618 feel considerably harder than the other three categories suggest.
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Which February 18 puzzle is this?
Connections game #618 corresponds to February 18, 2025. It is a historical puzzle rather than a current “today’s Connections” answer. If you are looking for a February 18 puzzle from a later year, it will have a different game number and a different answer set.
Frequently Asked Questions
When was NYT Connections #618 published?
NYT Connections #618 was published on February 18, 2025. It is the puzzle numbered 618, not a February 18 puzzle from a later year.
What are the British words in Connections #618?
The purple group is BRITISHISMS: BUTTY, CHIPPY, FOOTY, and TELLY. In the intended British usage, these refer to a sandwich, a chip shop, soccer, and television.
Why is SQUARE in the meal group?
SQUARE belongs with FILLING, HEARTY, and SOLID because “a square meal” means a proper or substantial meal.
The Bottom Line
The solution to NYT Connections #618, published February 18, 2025, is CAVITY, HOLE, HOLLOW, PIT for CRATER; AVAILABLE, HANDY, NEARBY, READY for ACCESSIBLE; FILLING, HEARTY, SOLID, SQUARE for a substantial meal; and BUTTY, CHIPPY, FOOTY, TELLY for BRITISHISMS.
Quick Recap
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