Attention all Connections fiends, Wordle lovers and Spelling Bee solvers: Strands is a new game that the New York Times Games team is beta-testing. It will be free for everyone to play on the web beginning March 4.

This new puzzle is a word search with a unique twist. When solvers open the game, they will see a 6-by-8 grid of letters. Solvers can track the number of theme words they have found as they play.

Tracy Bennett, the Wordle editor, who also edits Strands, said the game will appeal to people who enjoy anagrams or games like Boggle and Scrabble. Everdeen Mason, the editorial director of Games, said it can even serve as a steppingstone for players seeking to understand the tricks of the Crossword.

How to Play

The objective is to find theme words that all have something in common, and a spangram that describes what they have in common.

The spangram must touch two opposite sides of the game board.

Today’s Theme is a clue on the board meant to guide gameplay.

Finding three words that are not part of the theme will unlock the “Hint” button and highlight the letters that make up a theme word.

Players can connect letters vertically, horizontally and diagonally, and can switch directions in the middle of a word.

Theme words fit the grid perfectly, with no letter used more than once.

Why a Word Search?

Zoe Bell, the executive producer of Games, said that word searches have a long history in newspapers. In 1968, Norman E. Gibat published word searches in the “Selenby Digest,” a flyer he distributed in Oklahoma supermarkets. Around the same time, Pedro Ocón de Oro, a Spanish puzzle maker, was creating word searches he called “sopas de letras,” or “soups of letters.” In the 1970s and 1980s, word searches started to appear more in newspapers and activity books.

Juliette Seive, a research director on the New York Times Games team, came up with the original pitch for Strands.

“I was talking to my partner about it, and