Need help with today's NYT Strand exercise? Today's theme, “Spell it out,” can be challenging at first, but a few answers on the board will help make it obvious.

Below are some helpful hints for Strand #254 and some answers when you need them. We will start with the hints and then lead you to the full answer for Strand #254.

WARNING: There are spoilers for Strand #254.

The official theme for NYT Strands #254 is... Spell It Out

And here's an unofficial tip from me: “Phonetics.”

If you're still not sure, here's a handy word that gives you a valuable hint token:

Still having trouble? Spangram gives you a hint on conjunctions. Today it starts with 'n' and ends with 't'.

Scroll down to see what it is.

It's NATOALPHABET.

Now, what's the answer to today's strand?

Drumroll, please.

... Spangram was NATOALPHABET.

Strands #254

“Spell it out”

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Hello Strands fans! I immediately recognized the fact that this is about phonetic spelling of letters, and I immediately recognized the word “alphabet”. Unfortunately, I didn't understand spangram for a while because I didn't know what this official name was.

Nevertheless, the “X” led me straight to FOXTROT, and I knew I was on the right track. With this in mind, I found DELTA and GOLF to its right and set it up nicely.

BRAVO was also a word I associated with this theme and was at the top of the left. This left enough space to complete the spangram NATOALPHABET. Of course!

Thankfully, I did not have to recite all 26 words in the code, and only three remained on the grid; TANGO was in the upper left corner and VICTOR was diagonally to the right of it. To complete the puzzle, only the ECHO in the upper right corner remained.

Are you reading in a later time zone than this? Click here to read the full article about Strand's solution to yesterday's game #253.