NYT Connections Hints and Answers Today: June 4, 2026

Need the NYT Connections hints and answers for today, June 4, 2026? This guide keeps the spoilers in stages, so you can stop after a nudge or scroll down for the full solution.

Today’s puzzle, #1162, has a clean mix of art terms, lively style words, hip-hop references, and phrases that follow the word “ghost.” A few entries are easy to misread because they can belong to more than one world. OIL can point to cooking, painting, or machinery. VINEGAR can feel like a kitchen word before it reveals its older meaning. RUN can look like a verb instead of part of a music name.

For deeper background after the puzzle, FluentSlang has explainers on gouache meaning, panache meaning, and ghost kitchen meaning.

Today’s Connections Words

The 16 words in today’s Connections are:

ACRYLIC, GOUACHE, OIL, TEMPERA, GUSTO, PANACHE, VERVE, VINEGAR, BEASTIE, PUBLIC, RUN, SALT, KITCHEN, PEPPER, TOWN, WRITER.

At first glance, the board has a few tempting kitchen paths. OIL, VINEGAR, SALT, PEPPER, and KITCHEN all point toward food. That is the biggest early trap. Connections often gives you a visible group of five that looks strong, then asks you to notice that one word belongs somewhere else.

Quick No-Spoiler Hints

Yellow: Think about materials an artist might put on a brush.

Green: These words describe lively style, energy, or spirit.

Blue: Each word begins the name of a famous hip-hop group.

Purple: Put one word before each of these to make a familiar phrase.

Stronger Hints

Yellow is not about colors. It is about types of paint or painting media.

Green includes a word that may surprise you: VINEGAR. Here it means sharpness or spirit, not the liquid in your pantry.

Blue is about music history. Think Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Run-D.M.C., and Salt-N-Pepa.

Purple uses the same missing word each time. The missing word can pair with KITCHEN, PEPPER, TOWN, and WRITER.

Today’s Connections Answers

PAINTING MEDIA: ACRYLIC, GOUACHE, OIL, TEMPERA.

ESPRIT: GUSTO, PANACHE, VERVE, VINEGAR.

STARTS OF CLASSIC HIP-HOP GROUPS: BEASTIE, PUBLIC, RUN, SALT.

GHOST ___: KITCHEN, PEPPER, TOWN, WRITER.

Why Each Group Works

PAINTING MEDIA: ACRYLIC, GOUACHE, OIL, TEMPERA.

These four are kinds of paint or painting media. Acrylic paint is water-based and dries quickly. Gouache is an opaque watercolor-like paint. Oil paint uses oil as the binder and usually dries slowly. Tempera is an older paint type often linked with egg tempera or school poster paint.

The trap is OIL. It easily joins a fake food group with VINEGAR, SALT, and PEPPER. That group looks natural, but it leaves KITCHEN hanging and ignores the art words. Once GOUACHE and TEMPERA appear together, the art route becomes much stronger.

ESPRIT: GUSTO, PANACHE, VERVE, VINEGAR.

Esprit means spirit, liveliness, or flair. GUSTO means eager enjoyment. PANACHE means stylish confidence. VERVE means energy and sparkle. VINEGAR can mean sharpness, force, or a spirited bite in a person’s manner.

The trap is VINEGAR again. Most solvers see it as a condiment. But Connections often uses a secondary meaning to break a food list. If you know panache meaning, this group gets easier because PANACHE, GUSTO, and VERVE all live in the same “lively style” family.

STARTS OF CLASSIC HIP-HOP GROUPS: BEASTIE, PUBLIC, RUN, SALT.

Each word starts the name of a classic hip-hop group: Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Run-D.M.C., and Salt-N-Pepa. The clue is not asking for full names. It is asking you to spot the first word or first part of the group name.

The trap is that these words look unrelated. BEASTIE feels like a nickname. PUBLIC feels like an adjective. RUN is a common verb. SALT feels like food. The category only clicks when you hear the names aloud and complete the famous group names in your head.

GHOST ___: KITCHEN, PEPPER, TOWN, WRITER.

Each word forms a phrase after GHOST: ghost kitchen, ghost pepper, ghost town, and ghost writer. A ghost kitchen is a delivery-focused food business without a normal dine-in restaurant space. A ghost pepper is a very hot pepper. A ghost town is an abandoned place. A ghost writer writes for someone else without getting public credit.

The trap is that KITCHEN, PEPPER, and SALT may pull you back toward food. But SALT belongs in the hip-hop group category. For more on the modern business phrase, see ghost kitchen meaning.

Tricky Words And Decoys

GOUACHE is tricky because many people have seen the word on paint tubes but may not know how to pronounce it or classify it. In the puzzle, it matters because it confirms that ACRYLIC, OIL, and TEMPERA are not random materials. They are painting media. Our gouache meaning page explains the art term in plain English.

VINEGAR is the sneakiest word on the board. It creates a fake food cluster with OIL, SALT, PEPPER, and KITCHEN. But in the answer, it means bite, sharpness, or force of character. Someone with “vinegar” in them has energy and edge.

RUN is another strong decoy. It can be a verb, a race, a streak, a print run, or a tear in fabric. Here it points to Run-D.M.C. The puzzle expects pop-culture recognition, not a dictionary definition.

SALT also works as a decoy because it fits the false food path. In today’s answer, it starts Salt-N-Pepa. That makes the blue group harder if you solved the food-looking words too early.

KITCHEN looks like a place, but with GHOST it becomes a modern restaurant phrase. That makes the purple group feel current instead of purely old-fashioned.

How To Solve More Puzzles Like This

When a Connections board gives you five words that seem to belong together, slow down. Five-word clusters are often bait. Today, OIL, VINEGAR, SALT, PEPPER, and KITCHEN looked like a clean food group, but Connections groups only have four words. One or two of those words had to move.

Look for the most technical words first. GOUACHE and TEMPERA are not everyday words for many players. When two technical words share a field, they can anchor a category. From there, ACRYLIC and OIL become easier to place.

Watch for words with older or secondary meanings. VINEGAR does not only mean a sour liquid. It can mean sharp spirit. PANACHE, VERVE, and GUSTO point toward that meaning.

Also listen for partial names. BEASTIE, PUBLIC, RUN, and SALT do not describe the same thing by themselves. But when completed as famous music names, they fit perfectly.

Finally, test fill-in-the-blank groups. If one hidden word can sit before four different words, you may have the purple category. Today, GHOST works before KITCHEN, PEPPER, TOWN, and WRITER.

FAQ

What was the hardest category in today’s Connections?

The blue hip-hop group category was likely the hardest if the group names did not come quickly. The words look ordinary until you complete the names.

Why is VINEGAR in the ESPRIT group?

VINEGAR can mean sharp energy, bite, or spirited force. It is not being used as a food word here.

What does gouache mean?

Gouache is an opaque water-based paint. It is often described as sitting between watercolor and poster paint in how it looks and handles.

What is a ghost kitchen?

A ghost kitchen is a food business set up mainly for delivery orders, usually without a regular dining room for customers.

Is NYT Connections the same every day for everyone?

For the standard daily puzzle, yes. Players get the same puzzle for that date, though archives and timing can vary by account and region.