NYT Strands today — hints, answers and spangram for Saturday, October 19 (game #230)

Strands is the NYT’s latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it’s great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my Wordle today, NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know the answers.

NYT Strands today (game #230) – hint #1 – today’s theme

NYT Strands today (game #230) – hint #2 – clue words

Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.

• SPAN
• SPAR
• PROM
• HERE
• SOME
• MOTE

NYT Strands today (game #230) – hint #3 – spangram

NYT Strands today (game #230) – hint #4 – spangram position

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Strands today (game #230) – the answers

The answers to today’s Strands, game #230, are…

• ZING
• KICK
• SPARK
• PIZZAZZ
• FIZZ
• OOMPH
• VERVE
• SPANGRAM: EXTRASOMETHING

• My rating: Moderate
• My score: 1 hint

Look at all those Zs! Seven of them in total, including four in PIZZAZZ alone. These did help me to get started, though, because Z doesn’t go with many other letters (vowels, basically), which made it easier to find ZING. Plus ZZ is an obvious combination and it was fairly easy to also find FIZZ and the aforementioned PIZZAZZ. I stumbled upon KICK and SPARK by accident and by that point had so much of the board uncovered that it felt like completing it would be a simple task.

But no. I stalled at that stage and needed a hint to unlock OOMPH. That did the trick, and when I finally spotted the spangram, EXTRASOMETHING, victory was only a guess away.

How did you do today? Send me an email and let me know.

Yesterday’s NYT Strands answers (Friday, 18 October, game #229)

• GYOZA
• SAMOSA
• WONTON
• PIEROGI
• EMPANADA
• SPANGRAM: DUMPLINGS

Marc is TechRadar’s Global Editor in Chief, the latest in a long line of senior editorial roles he’s held in a career that started the week that Google launched (nice of them to mark the occasion). Prior to joining TR, he was UK Editor in Chief on Tom’s Guide, where he oversaw all gaming, streaming, audio, TV, entertainment, how-to and cameras coverage. He’s also a former editor of the tech website Stuff and spent five years at the music magazine NME, where his duties mainly involved spoiling other people’s fun. He’s based in London, and has tested and written about phones, tablets, wearables, streaming boxes, smart home devices, Bluetooth speakers, headphones, games, TVs, cameras and pretty much every other type of gadget you can think of. An avid photographer, Marc likes nothing better than taking pictures of very small things (bugs, his daughters) or very big things (distant galaxies). He also enjoys live music, gaming, cycling, and beating Wordle (he authors the daily Wordle today page).