NYT Strands hints and answers for Monday, July 20 (game #869)

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Looking for a different day?

A new NYT Strands puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Sunday's puzzle insteadthen click here: NYT Strands hints and answers for Sunday, July 19 (game #868) .

Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Strands today (game #869) - hint #1 - today's theme

What is the theme of today's NYT Strands?

•Today's NYT Strands theme is… Small talk

NYT Strands today (game #869) - hint #2 - clue words

Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.

• COIN

• SLOT

• METER

• SMUT

• SUIT

• MUSTY

NYT Strands today (game #869) - hint #3 - spangram letters

How many letters are in today's spangram?

•Spangram has 9 letters

NYT Strands today (game #869) - hint #4 - spangram position

What are two sides of the board that today's spangram touches?

• First side:left, 4th row

• Last side:right, 6th row

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Strands today (game #869) - the answers

The answers to today's Strands, game #869, are…

• TINY

• LITTLE

• MICROSCOPIC

• MINIATURE

• MINUSCULE

• SPANGRAM: ITSYBITSY

• My rating:Easy

• My score:Perfect

Yesterday's theme was "big talk" and today it's "small talk". I'm looking forward to medium talk tomorrow.

Anyway, I digress. After the relatively easy spots of TINY and LITTLE it was on to the more niche descriptions of very small things, with MICROSCOPIC bringing me a little tingle of enjoyment from connecting an 11-letter word.

After yesterday's odd spangram of "supersizeit" I was expecting a similarly descriptive snake today, so ITSYBITSY took me a while — despite how perfectly it fitted the search. Either way, it's a spangram that demonstrates that small things are more fun than big things.

Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Sunday, July 19, game #868)

• GIANT

• MAMMOTH

• COLOSSUS

• BEHEMOTH

• LEVIATHAN

• SPANGRAM: SUPERSIZEIT

What is NYT Strands?

Strands is the NYT's not-so-new-any-more word game, following Wordle and Connections. It's now a fully fledged member of the NYT's games stable that has been running for a year and which can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.

I've got a full guide to h ow to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you're struggling to beat it each day.