Sunday’s New York Times Strands puzzle wants players thinking extra large. Puzzle No. 868, published July 19, 2026, hides a horizontal spangram, SUPER SIZE IT, underneath five words that all mean roughly the same gigantic thing, in a theme the paper simply calls Big Talk.
That is the fun part. The less obvious part is that this daily word search sits inside a much bigger, well-documented number. The New York Times has told investors, in its own regulatory filings, that its puzzle habit is now a real driver of the subscriber growth the newsroom alone no longer produces on its own.
Big Talk, Big Grid
Today’s official hint, printed alongside the puzzle, reads simply: Larger than life. Forbes contributor Kris Holt framed the same idea a bit more bluntly, describing the day’s answers as BIG words that also mean BIG, gargantuan and the like.
For anyone new to the game, Strands works differently from a normal word search. Players get a six-by-eight grid of 48 letters and a one-line theme clue. Words can run in any direction, including diagonally, and can bend mid-word, something no classic word-search puzzle allows. Every single letter on the board belongs to an answer. Nothing is wasted space.
Stuck players are not left completely on their own. Find three valid words of four or more letters that are not part of the theme, and the game unlocks a hint that highlights the letters of one theme word without giving away the word itself.
The Spangram and Every Word in the Grid
The spangram, the special answer that spans two opposite sides of the board and sums up the whole theme, is SUPER SIZE IT. It runs horizontally today, starting with an S and ending in a T, based on multiple outlets’ breakdowns of the finished grid.
Here is the complete answer list for puzzle No. 868, along with a bit of the trivia buried inside each word.
| Answer | Quick Note |
|---|---|
| GIANT | The plainest of the bunch, a straightforward stand-in for anything oversized. |
| BEHEMOTH | Pulled from the Book of Job, where it describes an enormous, untamable beast. |
| COLOSSUS | Echoes the Colossus of Rhodes, the giant bronze statue counted among the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. |
| LEVIATHAN | Another biblical sea monster, and a former wrestling ring name for Dave Batista before he rebranded as The Animal. |
| MAMMOTH | The extinct, shaggy relative of the elephant, whose remains still turn up frozen in permafrost. |
| SUPER SIZE IT (spangram) | The phrase most familiar from fast-food combo meals, ties the whole board together. |
Solvers online generally agreed the puzzle played fair once the theme clicked. One TechRadar write-up called LEVIATHAN an incredible word for a puzzle grid, rare enough in everyday use to slow down even confident solvers.
Why Does a Word Search Show Up in SEC Filings?
Because the Times has told investors, in black and white, that games are one of the products keeping subscribers paying every month. The company added 450,000 net digital subscribers in a single quarter recently, and puzzles like Strands are a documented reason people stick around once a free trial ends.
The most recent numbers come straight from the company’s own results. In its fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 report, filed with the SEC on February 4, 2026, the Times laid out exactly how the subscription business is trending.
- 12.78 million total subscribers by the end of 2025, across print and digital products.
- 450,000 net new digital-only subscribers added compared with the end of the third quarter of 2025.
- 13.9 percent year-over-year growth in digital subscription revenue for the full year.
- 310,000 more net digital subscribers added the following quarter, pushing the total past 13 million.
That last figure comes from the company’s first-quarter 2026 results, which described a company that now sells more than 13 million subscribers on a mix of news, games, sports, cooking and shopping advice rather than news alone. Digital-only subscription revenue grew roughly 16 percent that quarter to $389 million, according to the earnings call covering those results.
Strands Plays Jumped 15 Percent in a Year
Strip out the balance sheet and the puzzle-specific numbers tell almost the same story. According to figures a New York Times spokesperson gave The Verge, Strands was played 1.3 billion times in 2024, its first partial year of existence. By 2025, that number had climbed to 1.5 billion, a jump of roughly 15 percent, alongside 1.4 billion plays of the Mini Crossword and 1.6 billion completed Connections puzzles, out of 11.2 billion total puzzle plays across the whole library that year.
Jonathan Knight, the Times’ head of games, described the broader strategy behind that growth to Creative Review in terms that go beyond any single title.
Wordle was obviously a rocket booster to everything that we had going in the strategy, but it was really a case of building on foundations that were already there.
Knight joined the games team in 2020, well before Wordle’s viral break, with the stated goal of making the Times games section the premier destination for thoughtful play. Caitlin Roper, the Times’ executive editorial director for film and TV, put the current scale in plainer terms to Fast Company, saying tens of millions of people play New York Times Games every single day, with more than half of weekly users solving more than one puzzle daily and over a quarter tackling four or more.
From a Game Jam Pitch to the Fifth Daily Flagship
Strands is younger than that scale suggests. The idea started with Juliette Seive, a research director on the Times games team, who pitched it at the company’s internal annual game jam. A concept committee approved a prototype a few weeks later, and the game entered public beta on March 4, 2024, playable only on the Times website at first.
It left beta and became a full release in late June 2024, joining the NYT Games app alongside Wordle and Connections. Tracy Bennett, who also edits Wordle, edits Strands as well, giving both of the Times’ most-played word games the same editorial hand.
That is a fast climb for a game barely two years removed from beta. It now ranks as the fifth flagship daily in the Times lineup, behind only Wordle, Connections, the Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee in how the company talks about its core puzzle stable.
Free Puzzles Are Already Shrinking Around It
None of this growth has come without cost to what used to be free. Over the past year, the Times has steadily narrowed how much of its games library people can play without paying.
- Mini Crossword – moved behind a subscription by the end of August 2025 after years as an open daily.
- Tiles and Letter Boxed – shifted behind that same paywall at roughly the same time.
- Spelling Bee – free play now cuts off before reaching the Good or Solid ranking tiers, rather than running open-ended.
- Strands archive – arrived in September 2025 as part of that same subscriber-only push, rather than as a free back catalogue.
Games now sit as one of four pillars, alongside The Athletic, Cooking and Wirecutter, that the Times bundles to keep subscribers paying every month, according to Editor and Publisher. Zoe Bell, the Times’ executive producer of games, told the trade outlet the company is thrilled with how its in-house titles keep performing, calling Connections the most successful game the Times has built since the Mini Crossword’s 2014 debut.
Today’s Strands puzzle is still free to solve, no subscription required, at least for now.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is NYT Strands still free to play right now?
Yes. The daily Strands puzzle remains open to everyone without a subscription as of July 2026, even as the archive of past puzzles and several sibling games, including the Mini Crossword, Tiles and Letter Boxed, now sit behind a paywall.
What was the Strands answer for July 18, 2026?
Saturday’s puzzle, No. 867, ran the theme A Healthy Breakfast, with the spangram BOWL OF GRANOLA and theme words including WHOLESOME, NUTTY, SALTY and SWEET describing the texture and taste of a morning bowl.
How do you earn a hint in Strands?
Find three words of four or more letters that are not part of the puzzle’s theme, and the game unlocks a hint button. Tapping it highlights the letters that make up one theme word without spelling it out.
How many letters are on the Strands board?
Every Strands puzzle uses a six-by-eight grid of exactly 48 letters, with every letter belonging to either a theme word or the spangram and none left over.
Why did the Times build Strands instead of just expanding Connections?
Connections and Wordle both reward speed and quick pattern recognition. Strands was designed to reward patient, thematic reading instead, giving the Times a third distinct style of puzzle rather than a variation on games it already had.
Do you need a different subscription just to play Strands?
Strands is included in the Times’ All Access bundle alongside News, Cooking, The Athletic and Wirecutter, and the company also sells a standalone Games subscription for people who only want the puzzles.
