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.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don’t read on if you don’t want to know the answers.
Your Strands expert
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Your Strands expert
Marc McLaren
NYT Strands today (game #226) – hint #1 – today’s theme
What is the theme of today’s NYT Strands?
• Today’s NYT Strands theme is… Beast mode
NYT Strands today (game #226) – hint #2 – clue words
Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.
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THREE
FREE
TREE
CELL
HEEL
SCAR
NYT Strands today (game #226) – hint #3 – spangram
What is a hint for today’s spangram?
• Tooth and claw
NYT Strands today (game #226) – hint #4 – spangram position
What are two sides of the board that today’s spangram touches?
First: bottom, 3rd column
Last: top, 3rd column
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON’T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Strands today (game #226) – the answers
(Image credit: New York Times)
The answers to today’s Strands, game #226, are…
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SCALE
FEATHER
HAIR
HORN
SHELL
WING
SPANGRAM: CREATUREFEATURE
My rating: Moderate
My score: Perfect
This was a tricky Strands puzzle. The words are all well known, but I wasn’t entirely sure what it was I was looking for until a fair way into it, and it took me ages to find the spangram. That answer – CREATUREFEATURE – winds up and down the board using 15 letters, so getting it was fairly crucial to solving the puzzle. It’s always crucial, of course, but on some days it doesn’t have an immediate impact on the ease with which you find most of the other solutions, but here it was so long that you really needed it in order to rule out others. I was never comfortable today until I had it, and that was late on.
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Yesterday’s NYT Strands answers (Monday, 14 October, game #225)
DOLLY
BUNGEE
TRUCK
BOXES
FOAM
CRATE
TAPE
STRAP
SPANGRAM: MOVINGDAY
What is NYT Strands?
Strands is the NYT’s new word game, following Wordle and Connections. It’s now out of beta so is a fully fledged member of the NYT’s games stable and can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
I’ve got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you’re struggling to beat it each day.
Burning household rubbish in giant incinerators to make electricity is now the dirtiest way the UK generates power, BBC analysis has found.
Nearly half of the rubbish produced in UK homes, including increasing amounts of plastic, is now being incinerated. Scientists warn it is a “disaster for the climate” – and some are calling for a ban on new incinerators.
The BBC examined five years of data from across the country, and found that burning waste produces the same amount of greenhouse gases for each unit of energy as coal power, which was abandoned by the UK last month.
The Environmental Services Association, which represents waste firms, contested our findings and said emissions from dealing with waste are “challenging to avoid”.
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Nearly 15 years ago, the government became seriously concerned with the gases being produced from throwing away household rubbish in landfill and their contribution to climate change. In response, it hiked the taxes UK councils paid for burying waste.
Facing massive bills, councils turned to energy-from-waste plants – a type of incinerator that produces electricity from burning rubbish. The number of incinerators surged – in the past five years the number in England alone has risen from 38 to 52.
This is certainly the case for food waste, which produces less harmful greenhouse gases when burned, but it is not the case for plastic waste. Plastic is made of fossil fuels and burning it, rather than burying it in landfill, produces high levels of greenhouse gases.
In the past few years, more plastic has been going to incinerators and less food waste – which councils are now sending to anaerobic digesters or to be composted. But the government’s own calculations continue to assume that we send the same mix of rubbish as we did back in 2017 – potentially underestimating the scale of the issue.
The BBC’s five-year analysis used data on actual pollution levels recorded by operators at their incinerators, and found that energy-from-waste plants are now producing the same amount of greenhouse gases per unit of electricity as if they were burning coal.
For the past three decades, the UK has been reducing its use of coal because of how polluting it is – and last month closed its last coal plant. The government hopes this will help it achieve its target of ensuring electricity generation produces no carbon emissions by 2030.
This now leaves waste incineration as the dirtiest way the UK produces power. According to the BBC analysis, energy produced from waste is five times more polluting than the average UK unit of electricity.
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About 3.1% of the UK’s energy comes from waste incinerators – but the government’s independent advisory group, the UK Climate Change Committee, warns that incineration will make up an increasing part of emissions from electricity generation.
It’s an “insane situation”, said Dr Ian Williams, professor of applied environmental science at the University of Southampton.
“The current practice of the burning of waste for energy and building more and more incinerators for this purpose is at odds with our desire to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” he said.
“Increasing its use is disastrous for our climate.”
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Nearly half the UK’s household waste now goes to incinerators
Lord Deben, the Conservative environment minister who introduced the landfill tax in 1996, told the BBC: “We’ve got too many [incinerators], and we shouldn’t have any more… they begin to distort our ability to recycle.”
And yet, incinerators are still being built in England. The UK government approved a new £150m site in Dorset last month, overturning the local council’s decision to block it.
Dorset Council leader Nick Ireland told the BBC at the time that it “kneecaps” the county’s efforts to achieve their “net zero” target – the goal of no longer adding to carbon emissions by 2050.
In the past few years, Wales and Scotland have introduced bans on new incinerator plants over environmental concerns, and there have been increasing calls from leading academics and environmental groups for the same to happen in England and Northern Ireland.
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These include the UK Climate Change Committee, which has recommended that no more plants be built without efforts to capture all their carbon emissions.
There are currently only four out of 58 incinerators in the UK with approved plans to capture their emissions and one pilot project that is operating. This project at Ferrybridge EfW collects one tonne of carbon dioxide annually – but the site produces more than half a million tonnes of CO2.
Incinerators getting dirtier and bigger
Without action, it is expected that the use of incinerators in the UK will continue to grow and they will probably get more polluting.
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There are currently dozens of new plants going through the planning process, and existing ones are growing in capacity. The BBC investigation found nearly half of all incinerators in the UK have managed to get a capacity increase approved by the Environment Agency without applying for a new permit – which requires public consultation.
The waste they are burning is increasingly made up of plastic, according to local government data. Because plastic is produced from fossil fuels, it is the dirtiest type of waste to burn.
According to the government’s own statistics, burning plastic produces 175 times more carbon dioxide (CO2) than burying it in landfill.
Prof Keith Bell, who sits on the UK Climate Change Committee, said after reviewing the BBC’s findings: “If the current government is serious about clean power by 2030 then… we cannot allow ourselves to be locked into just burning waste.”
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Increasing amounts of plastic waste are making incineration more polluting
In April, a temporary ban on permits for new incinerators was introduced in England by the previous Conservative government, while it reviewed the role of burning waste, but when the ban lapsed in May it was not continued.
It appears that the current government has yet to decide its position on the issue.
In a letter last month, senior civil servants at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said they were unable to decide whether to approve a proposed incinerator in North Lincolnshire until the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) had decided the government’s policy on burning waste for power.
Considering the Dorset incinerator was approved by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, this letter raises questions about the consistency of the government’s approach on this issue.
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In response to a request for comment, a Defra spokesperson said: “We are considering the role waste incineration will play as we decarbonise and grow the economy.”
Councils ‘locked in’ to burning waste
The challenge is that even if local authorities wanted to move away from the use of energy-from-waste plants they are often unable to due to restrictive, long-term contracts.
The BBC made Freedom of Information requests to every UK local authority responsible for disposing of waste, which revealed that they have at least £30bn-worth of contracts with waste operators involving incinerators, some lasting more than 20 years.
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These arrangements have been criticised by the House of Commons public accounts committee for locking councils into financially burdensome arrangements.
Dr Colin Church, who led an independent review of incineration for the Scottish government which resulted in the ban, said: “‘Lock-in’ is a real issue, the energy-from-waste sector swears blind it’s not, but it is.”
In 2019, Derbyshire County Council and Derby City Council terminated their contract with waste company RRS because an incinerator it had built for them did not pass initial tests, with residents complaining about the smell and noise.
Although the plant had never been used, the councils were were ordered to pay £93.5m in compensation to RRS’s administrators for terminating the contract early.
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The BBC also found that dozens of councils had clauses in their contracts which demand a minimum amount of waste to be sent to incinerators for burning – known in the industry as “deliver or pay”.
In 2010, Stoke-on-Trent Council was left facing a £329,000 claim from Hanford Waste Services for not sending enough waste to be incinerated.
The council declined to say if it paid the claim but told us the clause has since been removed from its contracts with the operator.
BBC / Jon Parker Lee
Local authorities have more than £30bn of contracts involving incinerators, some lasting more than 20 years
But the Local Government Association (LGA) – representing local authorities in England and Wales – expressed concerns to the BBC that these contracts have left councils unable to explore the use of more environmental solutions, such as recycling, for fear of a fine for breach of contract.
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Joe Harris, vice chair of the LGA and leader of Cotswold District Council, said: “If we can adapt those contracts which allows us to reduce the amount of waste going to incineration and if we can boost recycling we want to do that, but we can’t have councils facing financial penalties.”
For the past 10 years recycling rates have failed to increase, remaining stuck at about 41% in England – despite a previous commitment by the previous Conservative government for 65% of the UK’s household waste to be recycled by 2035. Wales is the only nation to have hit the 65% target.
But the Environmental Services Association, the waste industry body, said burning rubbish for energy has been “complementary to efforts to recycle more” over the past decade and that “stagnant recycling rates are only indicative of a failure to develop recycling policies”.
A Defra spokesperson told the BBC: “We are committed to cutting waste and moving to a circular economy so that we re-use, reduce and recycle more resources and help meet our emissions targets.”
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How we calculated the emissions
In order to calculate the emissions produced per unit of energy from England’s incinerators, the BBC needed to obtain the emissions produced and the power output from these sites.
Each incinerator in the UK produces annual monitoring reports, which record key statistics associated with the plant including its total emissions.
But in a few cases the emissions were not recorded in the annual monitoring report and so the figures recorded in the government’s pollution inventory report were used.
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The IPCC, the UN climate science body, recommends that “biogenic” emissions – which come from burning organic matter like food – are not included in calculations because they are recorded under the emissions for the land and forestry sector.
So we had to remove these biogenic emissions from the total by working out what share of the waste being burned was organic.
Some operators recorded this, but in the cases where they did not the government guidelines advise applying a factor based on the share of household waste that was recorded as biogenic during a 2017 survey by the environmental NGO WRAP.
This gave the BBC the total fossil emissions – meaning those associated with burning the “fossil” waste (or non-organic waste) at the site, including plastic.
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Then we calculated a carbon intensity figure – the carbon emissions per unit of energy generated – for every site, by dividing the total fossil emissions by the energy generated.
Methodological support was provided by Francesco Pomponi, professor of sustainability science at Edinburgh Napier University; Massimiliano Materazzi, associate professor of chemical engineering at University College London; and Dr Jim Hart, sustainability consultant.
Connections is the latest puzzle game from the New York Times. The game tasks you with categorizing a pool of 16 words into four secret (for now) groups by figuring out how the words relate to each other. The puzzle resets every night at midnight and each new puzzle has a varying degree of difficulty. Just like Wordle, you can keep track of your winning streak and compare your scores with friends.
Some days are trickier than others. If you’re having a little trouble solving today’s Connections puzzle, check out our tips and hints below. And if you still can’t get it, we’ll tell you today’s answers at the very end.
In Connections, you’ll be shown a grid containing 16 words — your objective is to organize these words into four sets of four by identifying the connections that link them. These sets could encompass concepts like titles of video game franchises, book series sequels, shades of red, names of chain restaurants, etc.
There are generally words that seem like they could fit multiple themes, but there’s only one 100% correct answer. You’re able to shuffle the grid of words and rearrange them to help better see the potential connections.
Each group is color-coded. The yellow group is the easiest to figure out, followed by the green, blue, and purple groups.
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Pick four words and hit Submit. If you’re correct, the four words will be removed from the grid and the theme connecting them will be revealed. Guess incorrectly and it’ll count as a mistake. You only have four mistakes available until the game ends.
We can help you solve today’s Connection by telling you the four themes. If you need more assistance, we’ll also give you one word from each group below.
The Oppo Find X8 is one of Oppo’s upcoming smartphones, and while it’s leaked before in several capacities, it appears to have leaked for the first time in a series of high-quality renders that showcase the phone in all of its available colors. At least, what we can assume will be all of the phone’s available colors. The Find X8 will be a series of devices that Oppo plans to release soon and will have a variety of models not too unlike what Samsung has done with the Galaxy S24 series.
With that being said, today’s freshly leaked renders are of just the Oppo Find X8. The company is also expected to launch the Find X8 Pro, succeeding last year’s Find X7 Ultra. Oppo plans to launch the new series of phones on October 24, with the MediaTek Dimensity 9400 powering the lineup. A majority of the phone’s specs have also leaked. The phone will reportedly come with a 6.5-inch BOE panel, a 5,700mAh battery, 80W wired charging, and 50W wireless charging.
The phone is also said to be coming with an alert slider, which isn’t too surprising given that it’s a popular feature on OnePlus phones and Oppo owns OnePlus. It’s also shown up on previous Oppo devices.
The Oppo Find X8 will come in four colors according to leaked renders
While it’s unclear what the names of these colors will be, it does appear that Oppo will offer four different options. In a post from Evan Blass on X, you get a good look at the Find X8 from all sides. The renders also show three additional colors that we haven’t seen before. Past leaks have shown the phone coming in a black color option. Not everyone likes black phones though. Luckily, it looks like Oppo will offer the Find X8 in light blue, light pink, and white options for those who prefer phones with a lighter color scheme.
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You also get a much better look at the alert slider and the phone’s massive rear camera array. Much like past recent Oppo and OnePlus devices, the power button and the volume button will be on the right side of the device, with the power button being below the volume button.
The SIM card tray and USB-C charging port will be on the bottom of the phone alongside one of the phone’s speakers. Meanwhile, the microphones will be on top. The phone will also feature a camera button.
Oppo says this phone has the thinnest bezels in history
It’s too early to really judge if this is going to be true or not. However, the leaked renders certainly appear to show some pretty thin bezels. The phone also looks to have a flat display. Thin bezels most certainly look nice but it begs the question of how easy it might be to accidentally touch the display and engage an action with less to hold onto from the sides. Either way, Oppo has put together a visually stunning phone with the Find X8.
The Bose QuietComfort Ultra headphones came out almost exactly a year ago and now Amazon is selling the Lunar Blue colorway for $329, which is $100 off the MSRP (other hues are full price). We saw this price last week for all four colors during Amazon’s fall sale. Lunar Blue looks to be a limited edition, which could account for the discount, or it could just be Amazon’s way of keeping the deals engines burning after the end of October Prime Day.
Bose
This is a return to the all-time low price for Bose’s upgraded noise-cancelling headphones.
Engadget’s Billy Steele reviewed these when they came out last October, awarding them a respectable 86. The difference between this Ultra version and Bose’s standard QuietComfort headphones is the integration of Bose’s version of spatial audio.
The design saw some changes too, with a single multifunction control instead of the three buttons to handle playback and mode functions. There’s also a touch strip to adjust the volume. Some of the plastic was swapped out in favor of metal, and we found the comfort to be the same high level as with previous Bose cans — particularly for long listening sessions. And, of course, the active noise cancellation is still among the best you can get.
As for the Immersive Audio (the marquee feature) it’s good sometimes. It works with all content — not just content created to support it, such as Dolby Atmos in Apple Music or Sony’s 360 Reality Audio. But since it’s relying on signal processing instead of specially engineered sounds, the results vary. Sometimes it sounds great, other times not so much. But thankfully, Bose has improved the audio all around, so even without the new feature, the sound is warmer and clearer than on the standard QCs.
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In our guide to the best wireless headphones, we mention QuietComfort Ultra but point out that the $100 price jump from the standard QCs (our current ANC pick) isn’t quite worth it, since the success of the spatial audio isn’t consistent. But with this discount, the blue QC Ultra headphones are currently $20 cheaper than the originals. Could be a good day to go for the pricer/not pricier version.
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Change is inevitable; instead of resisting it, some companies are embracing it by stepping up with fresh ideas that make a real difference in our everyday lives. These innovators are challenging the status quo—whether it’s making healthier products more accessible, helping homeowners turn their spaces into income, or transforming how we care for our loved ones. These ten brands are breaking the mold, offering practical solutions that resonate with people and paving the way for a better, more connected future.
B Generous
B Generous has created the world’s leading credit marketplace for nonprofits. Despite nonprofits holding $8 Trillion worth of assets and generating $3.3 Trillion of annual income, nonprofits are very underserved when it comes to accessing bank credit. B Generous, a venture capital-backed FinTech company, addresses this gap with its first-of-its-kind Accelerate product, a B2B proprietary enterprise credit lending platform that provides upfront capital to nonprofits secured against future revenue. With backing from socially responsible banks and a venture capital round of over $10 million from leading VC funds in Silicon Valley and New York, B Generous has received more than $550 million in loan requests from more than 7,500 nonprofits within its first few months of launching and has already funded millions of dollars in loans. “We provide nonprofits with access to immediate capital so they can worry less about fundraising,” says CEO Dominic Kalms.
Credit Gnomes is shaking up the property management industry by transforming rent collection through its payment/credit reporting program. The company addresses the inefficiencies of traditional rent collection systems by reporting tenants’ rental payment data directly to major credit bureaus—Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion. In doing this, the company helps reduce delinquency, improve tenant screening, and provide property managers with an additional revenue stream. With Credit Gnomes, property managers can encourage timely payments and reward residents by helping them build their credit profiles. Key features include monthly reporting, enhancing tenants’ credit profiles in real-time for timely or late payments, and offering dispute management services to handle credit reporting discrepancies. “We want to change the collections process from reactive rent collections to proactive rent payments,” says CEO Dave Haldi. “Our technology not only benefits property managers by reducing costs but also supports tenants in building a positive credit history.”
Empowered-Home is a virtual health platform enabling chronically ill and aging individuals to safely stay in their homes, while providing caregivers with real-time situational awareness of patients’ health status. Intuitive situational awareness and AI-driven insights allow providers to optimize outcomes and proactively improve efficiency. With remote monitoring, AI-driven analytics, and real-time data integration within the clinical workflow, Empowered-Home addresses many challenges providers face under value-based care reimbursement models. The platform provides timely, actionable insights so clinicians can respond immediately to health status changes, reducing the overall burden on the healthcare system and significantly improving patient quality of life while reducing care inequities often observed among chronically ill populations. CEO Walt Pistor states, “Empowering patients and homes with the latest technology allows patients to live where they’re most comfortable while ensuring family members are kept aware that they receive the care they need when they need it—wherever home may be.”
Flockx is a different kind of social app that integrates AI Sidekicks into your social life to create a unique blend of human and AI interactions. The platform addresses the growing problem of social isolation by helping users find and connect with like-minded people in their local communities. Unlike traditional social apps that keep users glued to their screens, Flockx’s AI companions encourage real-world engagement by identifying and suggesting local activities or gatherings tailored to each user’s interests. The app solves the problem of finding and participating in meaningful social activities by showcasing these opportunities on a map, covering all types of events. This approach helps users discover and join local groups and activities that they might otherwise miss. “Our AI Sidekicks aren’t just about enhancing your social life—they’re about getting you out there, engaging with the world, and building connections that matter,” says Devon Bleibtrey, CEO of Flockx.
LandSkyAI delivers autonomous robotics solutions to address the growing challenges in the security industry. Traditional security methods, which rely heavily on human personnel, are increasingly burdened by labor shortages, high costs, and the complexities of integrating new technologies. LandSkyAI’s approach solves these problems by providing a turnkey solution that automates surveillance and inspection through advanced AI-powered drones and ground robots. Their platform offers a seamless, subscription-based model that allows organizations to enhance their security operations without the hassle of complex implementation. By handling everything from deployment to maintenance, LandSkyAI ensures that its clients receive continuous, proactive security coverage with minimal effort on their part. Founder Jake Shild explains, “We’ve created a package that eliminates the extra resources typically required from end users, making the adoption of robotics simple and creating a true automated experience.”
Makeena is transforming access to healthier, eco-friendly products with its innovative cashback and loyalty rewards platform. Makeena’s app seamlessly connects users with products that match their dietary needs and lifestyle choices, incentivizing purchases and fostering deeper brand engagement through interactive features. For brands, Makeena provides a powerful toolset to drive product trials, boost sales, and build lasting customer loyalty. The platform’s real-time insights, derived from first-party consumer-generated data, enable brands to refine their marketing strategies with precision. Founder and CEO Karen Frame explains, “In short, Makeena helps consumers discover, find, and earn cash and rewards on better products, no matter where they shop, while enabling brands to deepen their engagement with consumers and expand their market reach.”
NextNest helps homeowners and renters generate extra income whenever they travel. In cities across North America and Europe, like Toronto, residents often spend over 60% of their income on rent or mortgage payments, highlighting the severe housing affordability crisis. NextNest offers a solution by transforming homes into premium short-term rentals while owners go on vacation, returning them 70-80% of their rental income when they return home. Becoming a co-host is simple: sign up online, set travel dates, and let NextNest take care of the rest. They manage everything from listing the property on Airbnb to guest interactions and property maintenance. Homeowners return to find their homes in pristine condition and extra income in their bank accounts. “We’re changing how people think about short-term rentals,” says CEO Desmond Yeo. We help homeowners use their properties to boost financial stability and enjoy life without adding to housing unaffordability.
R-Daniel is a state-of-the-art AI-driven analytics platform tailored for executives in the B2B manufacturing and distribution sectors. Acting as a dynamic “newspaper” for your company, R-Daniel delivers up-to-date insights on revenue and profit, ensuring leaders are always informed of the latest developments. Unlike traditional dashboards constrained by preset parameters, R-Daniel’s proprietary features—Automatic Discovery and Relevant Push—autonomously identify critical insights, adapting dynamically to organizational behavior through self-learning algorithms. This innovative approach enables executives to swiftly capitalize on opportunities, mitigate revenue losses, and optimize sales strategies with minimal effort. Notably, R-Daniel excels at uncovering “unknown unknowns,” critical blind spots that conventional solutions often miss. R-Daniel empowers businesses to make informed decisions with unparalleled speed and precision by integrating up-to-date and historical data. As Co-Founder Juan Hurtado states, “R-Daniel’s ability to think like a business leader and autonomously surface key insights is what sets us apart in the industry.”
Visible Assets specializes in advanced asset tracking using RuBee, an active, low-frequency wireless technology designed to solve the limitations of traditional RFID and GPS systems. RuBee operates in harsh environments, where other technologies fail, by effectively penetrating through liquids, metals, and underground. Rubee is designed to be safe near and on explosives, fuzed ordinance and built to minimize security risks. This versatility makes it indispensable for industries such as defense, manufacturing, and logistics, where reliable tracking of high-value assets is critical. Key features of RuBee include long battery life, secure and encrypted data transmission, and immunity to environmental interference like noise and temperature fluctuations. The system integrates seamlessly with existing infrastructure, providing real-time visibility and control over assets. Visible Assets’ technology is particularly suited for environments that require high security and precision. CEO John Stevens notes, “With RuBee, we’re providing an AIT solution that works”
YouSolar’s PowerBloc® is a multi-source nanogrid that is the first practical utility power replacement that can power everything from small appliances to large loads like air conditioners and electric vehicles. PowerBloc allows homes and businesses to become independent from an increasingly unreliable utility grid. PowerBloc makes the grid secondary or even optional. It is modular and scalable and seamlessly integrates solar, grid, and generator power with battery storage. It works with the grid or no grid at all. As a “grid-forming” power supply to the house, PowerBloc requires no utility approval. By addressing the common challenges of grid dependency—such as rising energy costs, outages, and lack of control—YouSolar empowers consumers to take charge of their energy future. “Our vision has always been to power the world with a compact, entirely plug-and-play system that can be deployed anywhere, making sustainable energy accessible to everyone,” says Arnold Leitner, Founder and CEO of YouSolar.
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