The table provides clues for the roots of words in today's NY Times Spelling Bee. You're responsible for prefixes, suffixes, tense changes, plurals, doubling consonants before suffixes, and alternate spellings of roots. The TL;DR about the site comes after the table.
Past clues are available here
Table content
| clue # | words covered | root 1st letter | clue |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | F | “Done” in Italian |
| 2 | 1 | F | Type face; in some churches, it holds water for baptism |
| 3 | 1 | F | What you cover with a sock |
| 4 | 1 | F | Military post (Lee or Dix in NJ, e.g.) |
| 5 | 1 | F | (Literary) source (of knowledge or water, e.g.) |
| 6 | 1 | F | How many legs a dog has |
| 7 | 1 | F | Opposite of back; edge of a weather system |
| 8 | 1 | F | Showy clothing ornamentation, or rustling sound of skirts or dresses |
| 9 | 1 | F | Point at which a plan is realized |
| 10 | 1 | F | Public uproar (caused a…) |
| 11 | 1 | F | Japanese mattress, or sofa that can be unfolded into a bed |
| 12 | 1 | I | Collection of facts and tips, abbr. |
| 13 | 1 | I | Enter (go…the room), preposition |
| 14 | 1 | I | Announce upcoming thing (next guest), or prelude (beginner’s course, book preface), slang abbr. |
| 15 | 1 | I | TurboTax company, or know by feeling rather than evidence |
| 16 | 1 | I | Element Fe (number 26), or hot clothes presser, noun/verb |
| 17 | 1 | N | Slang abbr. for chem. used as explosive & heart med. |
| 18 | 1 | N | “Black” in French; or dark mystery genre (film…) |
| 19 | 1 | N | 12:00, midday, 🕛 |
| 20 | 1 | N | Vague idea, or small sewing accessory |
| 21 | 1 | N | In grammar, a person, place or thing |
| 22 | 1 | N | food, nourishment |
| 23 | 1 | O | Veg that makes you cry when cut |
| 24 | 1 | O | Preposition when mounting an animal or boarding a large vehicle |
| 25 | 1 | O | Set of clothes, or to provide with one, compound (compound) |
| 26 | 1 | O | Closing show music (antonym begins with IN–) |
| 27 | 1 | O | Sprint more quickly or farther in a footrace than someone else (compound) |
| 28 | 1 | R | Civil unrest, noun; or to rampage, verb |
| 29 | 2 | R | Top of a house (where Santa lands) |
| 30 | 1 | R | Plant anchor that sucks up water |
| 31 | 1 | R | Indian flatbread that isn’t naan |
| 32 | 1 | R | Spiral pasta, fusilli |
| 33 | 1 | R | Device or blade that spins |
| 34 | 1 | R | Disorderly retreat, or decisive defeat |
| 35 | 1 | R | Follow-up election after a tie or inconclusive result; rain or meltwater that flows because the soil cannot absorb it |
| 36 | 1 | R | Slight error in rotating tool |
| 37 | 1 | T | Bean curd |
| 38 | 1 | T | Animated film or character, slang abbr. (car-…) |
| 39 | 1 | T | Short horn sound; noun/verb |
| 40 | 1 | T | Singer Amos, actress Spelling, or donut shapes, Latin plural |
| 41 | 1 | T | Shinto shrine gate, NOT double plural of donut shapes |
| 42 | 1 | T | Ripped, adj. or past participle |
| 43 | 1 | T | Bull, Spanish |
| 44 | 1 | T | Legal wrong, NOT pastry |
| 45 | 1 | T | Italian ice cream with rum, almonds, & cherries |
| 46 | 1 | T | Take a guided one of these in a foreign city (on a ...bus?) |
| 47 | 1 | T | Promote, or offer horse racing tips |
| 48 | 1 | T | Musical group of 3 (Kingston...) |
| 49 | 1 | T | Son of Poseidon, largest Neptune moon; mollusk with a tall spiral shell |
| 50 | 1 | T | Fast walking pace for horses or people |
| 51 | 1 | T | Common game fish (rainbow…, e.g.) |
| 52 | 1 | T | College fee |
| 53 | 1 | T | Junction at which a road branches off from a main road (compound); someone or something repellent (slang) |
| 54 | 1 | T | Number of people who show up at an event (we had a great…last night for our poetry reading), compound |
| 55 | 1 | T | Private instructor |
| 56 | 1 | U | Labor org. (Teamsters, AFL-CIO) |
| 57 | 1 | U | Archaic preposition (Handel’s Messiah “…us a child is born”) |
This site provides clues for a day's New York Times Spelling Bee puzzle. It exists to make it easier for Kevin Davis to take a day off. Most of the clues come from him. There may be some startup problems, but long term I think I can put the clues together with no more than half an hour's work.
The "Bee Roots" approach is to provide explicit clues for root words, not every word. This is similar to what Kevin Davis does, but without information about parts of speech As logophiles, we are pretty good at putting on prefixes and suffixes, changing tense, and forming plurals (including Latin plurals!). The clues cover root words, arranged alphabetically by root word, with a count of words in the puzzle that come from each root. For example, if a puzzle includes ROAM and ROAMING, there will be a clue for ROAM and a count of 2. The root may not appear in the puzzle at all; for example, the 2021-07-23 Bee included ICED, DEICE, and DEICED. For such a puzzle, the clue would be for ICE with a word count of 3.
The Bee Roots approach involves judgement sometimes. For example, if a puzzle includes LOVE, LOVED, and LOVELY, how many roots are needed to cover them? LOVE and LOVED share the root LOVE, certainly, but LOVELY is tricky. LOVE is part of its etymology, but by now, the word means "exquisitely beautiful," which is a lot farther from the meaning of LOVE than swithcing to past tense. I'm inclined to treat LOVE and LOVELY as separate roots. You may not agree, which is fine. Another thing we logophiles share is a LOVE of arguing about words on Twitter.
One last complication, until another one pops up: a few roots have multiple spellings, for example LOLLYGAG and LALLYGAG. Depending on the day's letters, and maybe even the editor's whims, one or both could be in the puzzle's answer list. With such roots, you could see a word count of 2, even if there are no applicable prefixes or suffixes.
I will do my best to keep this site up to date and helpful (I hope). Check it out, and tweet feedback to @donswartwout Tweet to @donswartwout
Many thanks to Kevin Davis, whose 4,500-word clue list made this possible.