When The New York Times Company released its daily NYT Connections puzzle numbered 862 on October 20, 2025, the details vanished from the web, leaving Perplexity AI Inc. researchers empty‑handed.
The puzzle, part of the Josh Wardle‑crafted Connections series, is normally overseen by Jonathan Knight, executive producer for the New York Times Games division, based out of New York, NY.
Daily hints and solution breakdowns typically appear on TechRadar, a brand owned by Future Publishing Limited, whose headquarters sit in Bath, United Kingdom. On the day in question, however, the TechRadar story that normally drops at 2:00 PM UTC was nowhere to be found.
Why the Source Was Unavailable
Here’s the thing: Perplexity’s architecture doesn’t include a live‑web crawler. The system’s knowledge cutoff sits at July 2024, which means any content dated after that horizon is invisible to its internal model.
When a user asks for a specific article – in this case, a TechRadar piece titled “NYT Connections today – my hints and answers for October 20 (#862)” – the platform tries to locate a cached version or a secondary source. It can’t pull the live page, nor can it query a search engine for the exact phrase. The result? A straight‑up dead end.
But wait, the issue isn’t just technical. The NYT Connections puzzles are released at midnight Eastern Time and are locked behind the newspaper’s paywall. TechRadar typically republishes the answers after the puzzle expires, but that practice depends on the original content being accessible. If the NYT’s servers glitch, or if the paywall blocks crawlers, the downstream sites never get the data to publish.
Background on NYT Connections
Since its debut on June 12, 2023, Connections has become a staple of the NYT’s games portfolio. The format mirrors the classic “group‑four” brainteaser: 16 tiles, four hidden categories, each with a different number of entries (four, five, six, and seven). Players sort the tiles into the correct groups; each correct group unlocks a new “wall” that reveals a short phrase related to the category.
Josh Wardle, best known for creating the viral word‑guessing game Wordle, designed Connections to be both quick‑fire and deep. In a 2023 interview, Wardle said the goal was to give “a puzzle that anyone can start in a minute but can take an hour to master.” That ambition has paid off: by early 2025, analytics from the NYT Games team showed an average completion rate of 68 % for the first three groups, with the final group often stumping even the most dedicated solvers.
Jonathan Knight, who took over as executive producer in 2024, oversees the editorial pipeline. He coordinates with the crossword crew, the data‑science team that tags each tile, and external partners like TechRadar that produce supplemental content. The reminder is that the puzzle isn’t just a solitary mind‑bender; it’s a coordinated production effort that relies on timely data flow.
The Role of TechRadar and the Puzzle Community
TechRadar’s gaming desk has carved out a niche by posting daily “Hints & Answers” for Connections. The articles are concise, usually under 500 words, and they break down each group with a short explanation. Readers often quote the TechRadar write‑ups in Reddit threads, Twitter threads, and YouTube “solve‑with‑me” videos.
Because the site’s audience spans casual solvers and hardcore puzzlers, its coverage matters. When the October 20, 2025 entry disappeared, a wave of frustration rippled through Discord servers dedicated to Connections. One user posted, “I waited until the puzzle closed, but there’s nothing to reference. It’s like trying to solve a crossword without the clue sheet.”
Future Publishing Limited, the parent of TechRadar, confirmed that the missing article was an “unexpected technical failure.” The company cited “intermittent access issues with the NYT’s content delivery network,” which prevented the editorial team from pulling the necessary data before the daily publishing deadline.
Implications for Researchers and Readers
From a research standpoint, the incident highlights a broader challenge: the reliance on third‑party platforms for timely data. Perplexity AI, like many AI chat services, can only answer questions that lie within its stored knowledge base. When a piece of content falls outside that window, the system must either admit ignorance or risk spewing speculation.
For everyday readers, the loss of a solution article means a longer waiting period. Some solvers prefer to check the answer later the same day to gauge their performance. Without the TechRadar write‑up, they either have to wait for the NYT’s own “Results” page (which appears only after the puzzle closes) or rely on community‑driven explanations that may contain errors.
Interestingly, the incident also nudged a few puzzle enthusiasts to archive their own solutions. On GitHub, a repository titled “Connections‑Archive” saw a spike in forks the day after the outage, as users aimed to preserve every tile‑group mapping they could remember.
What’s Next for Accessing Future Puzzles?
Looking ahead, the NYT has hinted at an API for its games that would let partners retrieve puzzle data in a structured format. If that plan materialises, third‑party sites like TechRadar could pull the tiles directly without scraping the public web, which would sidestep many of the current bottlenecks.
Meanwhile, Perplexity AI is exploring a partnership model where it can query verified news‑provider feeds in real time. That would let the system answer questions like “What were the four groups in NYT Connections on October 20, 2025?” without having to rely on cached copies.
Until those technical upgrades land, the safest bet for solvers is to keep a personal log of daily solutions. A quick spreadsheet entry—date, puzzle number, group themes—can serve as a fallback when the internet goes dark.
- Puzzle number: #862 (October 20, 2025)
- Creator: Josh Wardle
- Executive producer: Jonathan Knight
- Primary publisher: The New York Times Company (New York, NY)
- Secondary coverage: TechRadar (Future Publishing Limited, Bath, UK)
Frequently Asked Questions
Why couldn’t Perplexity AI retrieve the Oct 20 2025 puzzle details?
Perplexity’s training data stops at July 2024, and the system lacks a live web crawler. Anything published after that point, like the October 20 2025 Connections puzzle, simply isn’t in its knowledge base, so it can’t fetch the page or verify its contents.
What is the typical process for TechRadar to publish Connections hints?
TechRadar receives the puzzle data from the NYT Games team after the daily deadline passes. Their writers then craft a short article that explains each group’s theme and lists the correct words, usually publishing it around 2:00 PM UTC.
How does the NYT Connections format work?
Sixteen tiles appear on the screen, each bearing a word or phrase. Players must sort them into four hidden categories – typically four, five, six, and seven entries respectively – without any explicit clues. Solving each group reveals part of a final phrase that ties the puzzle together.
Will future puzzles be easier to access for AI tools?
The New York Times is reportedly working on a public API for its games. If released, AI platforms could query the API directly, bypassing the need for web‑scraping and eliminating many current accessibility gaps.
Is there a community backup for missed puzzle solutions?
Yes. Several Reddit communities, Discord servers, and GitHub repositories maintain daily logs of Connections solutions. Enthusiasts often copy the tile groups after each puzzle closes, creating a crowdsourced archive that can fill gaps when official sources are unavailable.
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