NYT Strands hints and answers for Friday, September 25 (game #936)

New York Times (NYT) Strands, the puzzle game that debuted after Wordle, Spelling Bee, and Connections, presents a new challenge each day. This game can be played daily at midnight in the user's time zone, meaning some players will tackle today's puzzle while others still work on yesterday's. If you're interested in yesterday's puzzle, NYT Strands hints and answers for Thursday, September 24 (game #935) can be found here.

Strands has proven to be an engaging game, though it can be challenging at times, so here are some hints to help you along the way. For those who enjoy other word-based games, you might also want to check out the hints and answers for NYT Connections today and Quordle today, as well as Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

Please note that the following information contains spoilers for today's NYT Strands game (#936), so avoid scrolling further if you don't wish to know the answers.

Today's theme for NYT Strands is 1x1, etc. To unlock the in-game hints system, play any of these words: BEST, REST, FARE, BARE, THEY, or STIR. The spangram, a word that spans the entire grid, consists of 12 letters. The spangram touches two sides of the board: the left side, specifically the 4th row, and the last side, the left side of the 5th row.

The answers to today's Strands puzzle are NINE, TWENTYFIVE, FOUR, EIGHTYONE, THIRTYSIX, and SPANGRAM: SQUARENUMBER. My assessment of today's game is that it is easy, and my score is perfect. It seems that the game may be missing a few words, with FOUR being the square of two, NINE the square of three, but missing sixteen, the square of four, before resuming with TWENTYFIVE, the square of five, and THIRTYSIX, the square of six, and then skipping seven and eight, before resuming with EIGHTYONE, the square of nine.