Mashable and Forbes publish puzzle hints and answers for July 9 2026

Mashable and Forbes publish puzzle hints and answers for July 9 2026

Digital publications including Mashable and Forbes have released a suite of guides and solutions for several popular New York Times word and logic games for Thursday, July 9, 2026. The guides cover a variety of challenges, ranging from the vocabulary-based Wordle and Connections to the logic-driven Pips.

Wordle Solution and Strategy

The solution for Wordle #1,846 on July 9 is AMEND. According to Rock Paper Shotgun, the word is defined as fixing, changing, or updating something with new and more relevant information. One strategy used to reach this result involved the starting words RAISE and CHANT, while another tip suggests that using the word mends would result in four yellow letters.

The game, originally created by software engineer Josh Wardle and acquired by The New York Times in January 2022 for a seven-figure sum, requires players to guess a five-letter word within six attempts. Letters are color-coded green for correct placement, yellow for misplaced letters, and gray for letters not present in the word.

For those seeking a greater challenge, players can enable Hard Mode, which mandates that all highlighted letters be used in subsequent guesses. Some players adopt Ultra-Hard rules, meaning every guess must potentially be the actual answer based on all prior clues.

NYT Connections Categories

The July 9 Connections puzzle requires players to group 16 words into four categories of four. The categories and their respective answers are as follows:

• Yellow (Easiest): Non-alcoholic designators — NA, spirit-free, virgin, and zero-proof.
• Green: Music publications — Billboard, Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, and Spin.
• Blue: Kinds of rugs, Persian, prayer, shag, and throw.
• Purple (Toughest): Pontiac models, Firebird, G6, Grand Prix, and Trans Am.

Associate puzzle editor Wyna Liu is credited by The Times with helping create the game. Players are allowed up to four mistakes before the game ends, though they can shuffle the board to better identify common threads.

Pips Logic Puzzle Walkthrough

Forbes provided a detailed walkthrough for the Pips puzzles, which feature multicolored boxes and dominoes. In Pips, players must fill a grid to satisfy specific conditions, such as totals equaling 0 or tiles being "greater than" or "less than" a specific number.

The Hard Pips puzzle for July 9 is themed RE, referencing words like Regarding, Redo, or Revolution. The solution involves a specific sequence of domino placements:

• A 1/6 domino from Orange 3 into Pink 6.
• A 2/6 domino from Blue 6 into Dark Blue 6.
• A 4/5 domino from Blue 6 up into Dark Blue > 7.
• A 3/1 domino from Dark Blue > 7 into Green < 2.
• A 5/2 domino from Blue > 4 into Green < 3.
• A 2/1 domino from Orange < 3 into Pink 3.
• A 3/2 domino from Purple 3 into Blue < 2.
• A 1/1 domino to fill the remaining Pink 3 tiles.
• A 4/3 domino from Purple > 3 into Pink 3.
• A 0/4 domino from Pink 3 down into Orange > 3.
• A 3/0 domino in Purple 3.
• A 2/4 domino from Orange 3 into the final free tile.

Hurdle and Other Word Games

Mashable also detailed the mechanics of Hurdle, a game consisting of five rounds. Players guess words based on correct, misplaced, and incorrect letters. If a player guesses correctly, the answer to the previous hurdle becomes the first guess for the next. For the final hurdle, all previous correct answers are displayed with their letters highlighted.

Other mentioned alternatives to these daily puzzles include Waffle, which involves swapping letters in a grid; Absurdle, where the solution changes after each guess; and Quordle, which requires solving four puzzles simultaneously. Mashable also promotes its own games hub featuring Sudoku, Mahjong, and free crosswords.