Blogroll

At a glance

• Microsoft Research releases PazaBench and Paza automatic speech recognition models, advancing speech technology for low resource languages.
• Human-centered pipeline for low-resource languages: Built for and tested by communities, Paza is an end-to-end, continuous pipeline that elevates historically under-represented languages and makes speech models usable in real-world, low-resource contexts.
• First-of-its-kind ASR leaderboard, starting with African languages: Pazabench is the first automatic speech recognition (ASR) leaderboard for low-resource languages. Launching with 39 African languages and 51 state-of-the-art models, it tracks three key metrics across leading public and community datasets.
• Human-centered Paza ASR models: Minimal data, fine-tuned ASR models grounded in real-world testing with farmers on everyday mobile devices, covering six Kenyan languages: Swahili, Dholuo, Kalenjin, Kikuyu, Maasai, and Somali.

According to the 2025 Microsoft AI Diffusion Report approximately one in six people globally had used a generative AI product. Yet for billions of people, the promise of voice interaction still falls short, and whilst AI is becoming increasingly multilingual, a key question remains: Do these models actually work for all languages and the people who rely on them? This challenge is one we first confronted through Project Gecko—a collaboration between Microsoft Research and Digital Green (opens in new tab), where field teams across Africa and India focused on building usable AI tools for farmers.

Gecko revealed how often speech systems fail in real‑world, low‑resource environments—where many languages go unrecognized and non‑Western accents are frequently misunderstood. Yet speech remains the primary medium of communication globally. For communities across Kenya, Africa, and beyond, this mismatch creates cascading challenges: without foundational data representing their languages and cultures, innovation stalls, and the digital and AI divides widen. 

Paza addresses this with a human-centered speech models pipeline. Through PazaBench, it benchmarks low-resource languages using both public and community-sourced data, and through Paza models, it fine-tunes speech models to deliver outsized gains in mid- and low-resource languages, evaluating with community testers using real devices in real contexts. Upcoming playbooks complement this work by sharing practical guidance on dataset creation, fine-tuning approaches with minimal data and evaluation considerations, introducing a continuous pipeline that enables researchers and practitioners to build and evaluate systems grounded in real human use.

How Project Gecko informed Paza’s design

In addition to building cost-effective, adaptable AI systems, the extensive fieldwork on Project Gecko highlighted an important lesson: Building usable speech models in low‑resource settings is not only a data problem, but also a design and evaluation problem. For AI systems to be useful, they must work in local languages, support hands‑free interaction through voice, text, and video, and deliver information in formats that fit real-world environments, that is, on low-bandwidth mobile devices, in noisy settings, and for varying literacy levels.  

These insights shaped the design of Paza, from the Swahili phrase paza sauti meaning “to project,” or “to raise your voice.”  The name reflects our intent: rather than simply adding more languages to existing systems, Paza is about co-creating speech technologies in partnership with the communities who use them. Guided by this principle, Paza puts human use first, which enables model improvement. 

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Start now Opens in a new tab PazaBench: The first ASR leaderboard for low-resource languages

PazaBench is the first automatic speech recognition (ASR) leaderboard dedicated to low‑resource languages. It launches with initial coverage for 39 African languages and benchmarks 52 state‑of‑the‑art ASR and language models, including newly released Paza ASR models for six Kenyan languages. The platform aggregates leading public and community datasets from diverse styles of speech including conversational, scripted read aloud, unscripted, broadcast news, and domain-specific data—into one easy‑to‑explore platform per language. This makes it easier for researchers, developers, and product teams to easily assess which models perform best across underserved languages and diverse regions, understand trade-offs between speed and accuracy while identifying where gaps persist. 

PazaBench tracks three core metrics:

1. Character Error Rate (CER) which is important for languages with rich word forms, where meaning is built by combining word parts, therefore errors at the character level can significantly impact meaning
2. Word Error Rate (WER) for word-level transcript accuracy
3. RTFx (Inverse Real‑Time Factor) which measures how fast transcription runs relative to real‑time audio duration.

More than scores, PazaBench standardizes evaluation to prioritize dataset gaps, identify underperforming languages, and highlight where localized models beat wider coverage ASR models—offering early evidence of the value of African‑centric innovation.

Explore PazaBench Request language evaluation Paza ASR Models: Built with and for Kenyan languages

The Paza ASR models consist of three fine-tuned ASR models built on top of state‑of‑the‑art model architectures. Each model targets Swahili, a mid-resource language and five low‑resource Kenyan languages; Dholuo, Kalenjin, Kikuyu, Maasai and Somali. The models are fine-tuned on public and curated proprietary datasets.  

Fine‑tuning the three models allowed us to explore supportive approaches toward a shared goal: building speech recognition systems that are usable for local contexts starting with the six Kenyan languages and bridging the gaps of multi-lingual and multi-modal video question and answering through the MMCT agent. (opens in new tab)

See the MMCT agent in action in the field

Early versions of two models in Kikuyu and Swahili were deployed on mobile devices and tested directly with farmers in real‑world settings, enabling the team to observe how the models performed with everyday use. Farmers provided in‑the‑moment feedback on accuracy, usability, and relevance, highlighting where transcripts broke down, which errors were most disruptive, and what improvements would make the models more helpful in practice. This feedback loop directly informed subsequent fine‑tuning, ensuring model improvements were driven not only by benchmark scores, but by the needs and expectations of the communities they are intended to serve.

Explore Paza Collection Here

Here is how Paza models compare to three state-of-the-art ASR models today:

Figure 1: Character Error Rate (CER) comparison across the Kenyan languages for several state‑of‑the‑art ASR models including the Paza models. Lower CER indicates better transcription performance. Figure 2: Word Error Rate (WER) comparison across the Kenyan languages for several state‑of‑the‑art ASR models including the Paza models. Lower WER indicates better transcription performance.

1) Paza‑Phi‑4‑Multimodal‑Instruct

Microsoft’s Phi‑4 multimodal‑instruct (opens in new tab) is a next‑generation small language model built to reason across audio, text, and vision. With Paza, we extend its audio capabilities, adapting a powerful multimodal architecture into a high‑quality automatic speech recognition (ASR) system for low‑resource African languages.

Fine‑tuned on unified multilingual speech datasets, the model was optimized specifically for transcription in the six languages. The model preserves its underlying transformer architecture and multi-modal capabilities, while selectively fine-tuning only the audio‑specific components, enabling strong cross‑lingual generalization.

As the results below show, this model delivers consistent improvements in transcription quality across all six languages.

Figure 3: Character Error Rate (CER) comparison across the six languages for the base model versus the finetuned Paza model. Lower CER indicates better transcription performance. Figure 4: Word Error Rate (WER) comparison across the six languages for the base model versus the finetuned Paza model. Lower WER indicates better transcription performance. Test the model here

2) Paza‑MMS‑1B‑All

This model is fine-tuned on Meta’s mms-1b-all model, which employs a large-scale Wav2Vec2.0-style encoder with lightweight language-specific adapters to enable efficient multilingual specialization. For this release, each of the six language adapters was fine‑tuned independently on curated low‑resource datasets, allowing targeted adaptation while keeping the shared encoder largely frozen.

As shown in the figures below, this model improves transcription accuracy while maintaining the model’s strong cross‑lingual generalization.

Figure 5: Character Error Rate (CER) comparison across the six languages for the base model versus the finetuned Paza model. Lower CER indicates better transcription performance. Figure 6: Word Error Rate (WER) comparison across the six languages for the base model versus the finetuned Paza model. Lower WER indicates better transcription performance. Join the Research Early Access Program

3) Paza‑Whisper‑Large‑v3‑Turbo

This model is finetuned on OpenAI’s whisper-large-v3-turbo base model. Whisper is a transformer-based encoder–decoder model which delivers robust automatic speech recognition (ASR) capabilities. This model was fine‑tuned on the entire unified multilingual ASR dataset, on the mentioned six languages, to encourage cross-lingual generalization. In addition, an extra post‑processing step was applied to address the known Whisper hallucination failure modes, improving transcription reliability.

As shown below, this release achieves improved transcription accuracy while retaining Whisper’s robustness.

Figure 7: Character Error Rate (CER) comparison across the six languages for the base model versus the finetuned Paza model. Lower CER indicates better transcription performance. Figure 8: Word Error Rate (WER) comparison across the six languages for the base model versus the finetuned Paza model. Lower WER indicates better transcription performance. Test the model here Where do we go from here

AI is reshaping how the world communicates. Designing with people, not just for them, means looking beyond the languages that are already well‑served. We plan to expand PazaBench beyond African languages and evaluate state‑of‑the‑art ASR models across more low‑resource languages globally. The Paza ASR models are an early step; truly supporting small and under‑represented languages requires dedicated datasets, strong local partnerships, and rigorous evaluation. Meaningful progress depends on sustained collaboration with the communities who speak these languages, and expanding responsibly means prioritizing depth and quality over broad but shallow coverage. 

As we continue this work, we’re distilling our methods into a forthcoming playbook to help the broader ecosystem curate datasets, fine‑tune responsibly, and evaluate models in real‑world conditions. And we’re not stopping at speech—additional playbooks will guide teams building AI tools and applications for multilingual, multicultural contexts, and give them practical recommendations for deploying across diverse communities. 

Together, these guides—grounded in technical advances and community‑driven design—share our learnings to help researchers, engineers, and designers build more human‑centered AI systems. 

Acknowledgements

The following researchers played an integral role in this work: Najeeb Abdulhamid, Felermino Ali, Liz Ankrah, Kevin Chege, Ogbemi Ekwejunor-Etchie, Ignatius Ezeani, Tanuja Ganu, Antonis Krasakis, Mercy Kwambai, Samuel Maina, Muchai Mercy, Danlami Mohammed, Nick Mumero, Martin Mwiti, Stephanie Nyairo, Millicent Ochieng and Jacki O’Neill.

We would like to thank the Digital Green (opens in new tab) team—Rikin Gandhi, Alex Mwaura, Jacqueline Wang’ombe, Kevin Mugambi, Lorraine Nyambura, Juan Pablo, Nereah Okanga, Ramaskanda R.S, Vineet Singh, Nafhtari Wanjiku, Kista Ogot, Samuel Owinya and the community evaluators in Nyeri and Nandi, Kenya — for their valuable contributions to this work.

We extend our gratitude to the creators, community contributors, and maintainers of African Next Voices Kenya (opens in new tab), African Next Voices South Africa (opens in new tab), ALFFA (opens in new tab), Digigreen (opens in new tab), Google FLEURS (opens in new tab), Mozilla Common Voice (opens in new tab) and Naija Voices (opens in new tab) whose efforts have been invaluable in advancing African languages speech data.

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The post Paza: Introducing automatic speech recognition benchmarks and models for low resource languages appeared first on Microsoft Research.

If you like playing daily word games like Wordle, then Hurdle is a great game to add to your routine.

There are five rounds to the game. The first round sees you trying to guess the word, with correct, misplaced, and incorrect letters shown in each guess. If you guess the correct answer, it'll take you to the next hurdle, providing the answer to the last hurdle as your first guess. This can give you several clues or none, depending on the words. For the final hurdle, every correct answer from previous hurdles is shown, with correct and misplaced letters clearly shown.

An important note is that the number of times a letter is highlighted from previous guesses does necessarily indicate the number of times that letter appears in the final hurdle.

If you find yourself stuck at any step of today's Hurdle, don't worry! We have you covered.

SEE ALSO: Hurdle: Everything you need to know to find the answers Hurdle Word 1 hint

Cheek make up.

SEE ALSO: Apple’s new M3 MacBook Air is $300 off at Amazon. And yes, I’m tempted. Hurdle Word 1 answer

BLUSH

Hurdle Word 2 hint

To pass out.

SEE ALSO: Wordle today: Answer, hints for February 5, 2026 Hurdle Word 2 Answer

SWOON

Hurdle Word 3 hint

A DJ.

SEE ALSO: NYT Connections Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for February 5 SEE ALSO: NYT Connections hints today: Clues, answers for February 5, 2026 Hurdle Word 3 answer

EMCEE

Hurdle Word 4 hint

Meaty.

Hurdle Word 4 answer

BEEFY

Final Hurdle hint

An object.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Games available on Mashable Hurdle Word 5 answer

THING

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

TL;DR: Live stream France vs. Ireland in the 2026 Six Nations for free on ITVX. Access this free live stream from anywhere in the world with ExpressVPN.

The Six Nations is all about unpredictable games between huge rivals. Any team could win any game, and that's the beauty of this famous competition. That being said, the opening game between France and Ireland feels like a final. You expect these sides to be battling it out at the top of the standings come the final round, so the winner here will gain a significant advantage.

The likes of Antoine Dupont and Louis Bielle-Biarrey will lead the way for the hosts. Ireland will need to rely on the talents of Tadhg Beirne, Dan Sheehan, and Jamison Gibson-Park if they want to secure a massive win under the lights in Paris.

If you want to watch France vs. Ireland in the 2026 Six Nations for free from anywhere in the world, we have all the information you need.

When is France vs. Ireland?

France vs. Ireland in the 2026 Six Nations starts at 8:10 p.m. GMT on Feb. 5. This fixture takes place at the Stade de France.

How to watch France vs. Ireland for free

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Live stream France vs. Ireland from anywhere in the world by following these simple steps:

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3. Open up the app and connect to a server in the UK

4. Visit ITVX

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What is the best VPN for the 2026 Six Nations?

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Welcome to your guide to Pips, the latest game in the New York Times catalogue.

Released in August 2025, the Pips puts a unique spin on dominoes, creating a fun single-player experience that could become your next daily gaming habit.

Currently, if you're stuck, the game only offers to reveal the entire puzzle, forcing you to move onto the next difficulty level and start over. However, we have you covered! Below are piecemeal answers that will serve as hints so that you can find your way through each difficulty level.

How to play Pips

If you've ever played dominoes, you'll have a passing familiarity for how Pips is played. As we've shared in our previous hints stories for Pips, the tiles, like dominoes, are placed vertically or horizontally and connect with each other. The main difference between a traditional game of dominoes and Pips is the color-coded conditions you have to address. The touching tiles don't necessarily have to match.

SEE ALSO: Wordle today: Answer, hints for February 5, 2026

The conditions you have to meet are specific to the color-coded spaces. For example, if it provides a single number, every side of a tile in that space must add up to the number provided. It is possible – and common – for only half a tile to be within a color-coded space.

Here are common examples you'll run into across the difficulty levels:

• Number: All the pips in this space must add up to the number.

• Equal: Every domino half in this space must be the same number of pips.

• Not Equal: Every domino half in this space must have a completely different number of pips.

• Less than: Every domino half in this space must add up to less than the number.

• Greater than: Every domino half in this space must add up to more than the number.

If an area does not have any color coding, it means there are no conditions on the portions of dominoes within those spaces.

SEE ALSO: NYT Strands hints, answers for February 5, 2026 Easy difficulty hints, answers for Feb. 5 Pips

Less Than (2): Everything in this space must be less than 2. The answer is 1-5, placed horizontally.

Equal (5): Everything in this orange space must be equal to 5. The answer is 1-5, placed horizontally; 5-2, placed vertically; 5-4, placed vertically.

Greater Than (2): Everything in this space must be greater than 2. The answer is 5-4, placed vertically.

Number (5): Everything in this space must add up to 5. The answer is 5-2, placed vertically; 3-0, placed horizontally.

Equal (0): Everything in this orange space must be equal to 0. The answer is 1-0, placed vertically; 3-0, placed horizontally.

Medium difficulty hints, answers for Feb. 5 Pips

Number (2): Everything in this space must add up to 2. The answer is 2-2, placed vertically.

Number (7): Everything in this space must add up to 7. The answer is 3-5, placed vertically; 2-2, placed vertically.

Number (4): Everything in this space must add up to 4. The answer is 4-2, placed vertically.

Number (3): Everything in this space must add up to 3. The answer is 3-2, placed vertically.

Equal (2): Everything in this green space must be equal to 2. The answer is 4-2, placed vertically; 3-2, placed vertically.

Number (2): Everything in this space must add up to 2. The answer is 1-2, placed horizontally.

Number (10): Everything in this space must add up to 10. The answer is 4-6, placed horizontally.

Greater Than (1): Everything in this space must be greater than 1. The answer is 6-2, placed horizontally.

Number (8): Everything in this space must add up to 8. The answer is 0-6, placed horizontally; 6-2, placed horizontally.

Hard difficulty hints, answers for Feb. 5 Pips

Number (5): Everything in this orange space must add up to 5. The answer is 5-1, placed horizontally.

Number (5): Everything in this dark blue space must add up to 5. The answer is 5-1, placed horizontally; 4-0, placed vertically.

Number (18): Everything in this space must add up to 18. The answer is 6-6, placed vertically; 6-0, placed horizontally.

Equal (0): Everything in this space must be equal to 0. The answer is 4-0, placed vertically; 6-0, placed vertically.

Number (5): Everything in this dark blue space must add up to 5. The answer is 4-5, placed horizontally.

Equal (1): Everything in this light blue space must be equal to 1. The answer is 1-1, placed horizontally.

Equal (4): Everything in this purple space must be equal to 4. The answer is 4-5, placed horizontally; 4-3, placed vertically; 4-2, placed horizontally.

Equal (2): Everything in this green space must be equal to 2. The answer is 4-2, placed horizontally; 2-5, placed vertically.

Equal (3): Everything in this light blue space must be equal to 3. The answer is 4-3, placed vertically; 3-3, placed horizontally; 3-0, placed horizontally.

Equal (0): Everything in this dark blue space must be equal to 0. The answer is 3-0, placed horizontally; 0-5, placed horizontally.

Number (10): Everything in this space must add up to 10. The answer is 2-5, placed vertically; 0-5, placed horizontally.

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Today's Connections: Sports Edition will be easy if you're a fan of pro racing and tennis.

As we've shared in previous hints stories, this is a version of the popular New York Times word game that seeks to test the knowledge of sports fans.

Like the original Connections, the game is all about finding the "common threads between words." And just like Wordle, Connections resets after midnight and each new set of words gets trickier and trickier — so we've served up some hints and tips to get you over the hurdle.

If you just want to be told today's puzzle, you can jump to the end of this article for the latest Connections solution. But if you'd rather solve it yourself, keep reading for some clues, tips, and strategies to assist you.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Play games on Mashable What is Connections: Sports Edition?

The NYT's latest daily word game has launched in association with The Athletic, the New York Times property that provides the publication's sports coverage. Connections can be played on both web browsers and mobile devices and require players to group four words that share something in common.

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Each puzzle features 16 words and each grouping of words is split into four categories. These sets could comprise of anything from book titles, software, country names, etc. Even though multiple words will seem like they fit together, there's only one correct answer.

If a player gets all four words in a set correct, those words are removed from the board. Guess wrong and it counts as a mistake — players get up to four mistakes until the game ends.

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Players can also rearrange and shuffle the board to make spotting connections easier. Additionally, each group is color-coded with yellow being the easiest, followed by green, blue, and purple. Like Wordle, you can share the results with your friends on social media.

SEE ALSO: Wordle-obsessed? These are the best word games to play IRL. Here's a hint for today's Connections: Sports Edition categories

Want a hint about the categories without being told the categories? Then give these a try:

• Yellow: Position chart

• Green: Homerun kings

• Blue: QB GOATS

• Purple: Major sporting event

Here are today's Connections: Sports Edition categories

Need a little extra help? Today's connections fall into the following categories:

• Yellow: Football Positions, Abbreviated

• Green: Members of the 500-HR Club

• Blue: First Names of QBs to Throw 500 Career TDs

• Purple: ___500

Looking for Wordle today? Here's the answer to today's Wordle.

Ready for the answers? This is your last chance to turn back and solve today's puzzle before we reveal the solutions.

Drumroll, please!

The solution to today's Connections: Sports Edition #500 is...

What is the answer to Connections: Sports Edition today?

• Football Positions, Abbreviated - CB, OT, S, TE

• Members of the 500-HR Club - BANKS, BONDS, FOXX, KILLEBREW

• First Names of QBs to Throw 500 Career TDs - AARON, DREW, PEYTON, TOM

• ___500 - ATP, DAYTONA, INDY, WTA

Don't feel down if you didn't manage to guess it this time. There will be new sports Connections for you to stretch your brain with tomorrow, and we'll be back again to guide you with more helpful hints.

Are you also playing NYT Strands? See hints and answers for today's Strands.

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Not the day you're after? Here's the solution to yesterday's Connections.

The NYT Connections puzzle today is not too difficult to solve if you're proud to be an American.

Connections is the one of the most popular New York Times word games that's captured the public's attention. The game is all about finding the "common threads between words." And just like Wordle, Connections resets after midnight and each new set of words gets trickier and trickier—so we've served up some hints and tips to get you over the hurdle.

If you just want to be told today's puzzle, you can jump to the end of this article for today's Connections solution. But if you'd rather solve it yourself, keep reading for some clues, tips, and strategies to assist you.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Play games on Mashable What is Connections?

The NYT's latest daily word game has become a social media hit. The Times credits associate puzzle editor Wyna Liu with helping to create the new word game and bringing it to the publications' Games section. Connections can be played on both web browsers and mobile devices and require players to group four words that share something in common.

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

Each puzzle features 16 words and each grouping of words is split into four categories. These sets could comprise of anything from book titles, software, country names, etc. Even though multiple words will seem like they fit together, there's only one correct answer.

If a player gets all four words in a set correct, those words are removed from the board. Guess wrong and it counts as a mistake—players get up to four mistakes until the game ends.

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

Players can also rearrange and shuffle the board to make spotting connections easier. Additionally, each group is color-coded with yellow being the easiest, followed by green, blue, and purple. Like Wordle, you can share the results with your friends on social media.

SEE ALSO: NYT Pips hints, answers for February 5, 2026 Here's a hint for today's Connections categories

Want a hint about the categories without being told the categories? Then give these a try:

• Yellow: Patriotic things

• Green: To clash

• Blue: They're the smae color

• Purple: Film icons

Here are today's Connections categories

Need a little extra help? Today's connections fall into the following categories:

• Yellow: Cultural symbols of the U.S.

• Green: Collide with

• Blue: Blue things

• Purple: Lees of Hollywood

Looking for Wordle today? Here's the answer to today's Wordle.

Ready for the answers? This is your last chance to turn back and solve today's puzzle before we reveal the solutions.

Drumroll, please!

The solution to today's Connections #970 is...

What is the answer to Connections today

• Cultural symbols of the U.S.: AMERICAN FLAG, APPLE PIE, BALD EAGLE, BASEBALL

• Collide with: BUMP, BUTT, KNOCK, RAM

• Blue things: BLUE THINGS

• Lees of Hollywood: ANG, BRUCE, CHRISTOPHER, SPIKE

Don't feel down if you didn't manage to guess it this time. There will be new Connections for you to stretch your brain with tomorrow, and we'll be back again to guide you with more helpful hints.

SEE ALSO: NYT Connections Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for February 5, 2026

Are you also playing NYT Strands? Get all the Strands hints you need for today's puzzle.

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Not the day you're after? Here's the solution to yesterday's Connections.

Today's NYT Strands hints are easy if you love groups.

Strands, the New York Times' elevated word-search game, requires the player to perform a twist on the classic word search. Words can be made from linked letters — up, down, left, right, or diagonal, but words can also change direction, resulting in quirky shapes and patterns. Every single letter in the grid will be part of an answer. There's always a theme linking every solution, along with the "spangram," a special, word or phrase that sums up that day's theme, and spans the entire grid horizontally or vertically.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Play games on Mashable

By providing an opaque hint and not providing the word list, Strands creates a brain-teasing game that takes a little longer to play than its other games, like Wordle and Connections.

If you're feeling stuck or just don't have 10 or more minutes to figure out today's puzzle, we've got all the NYT Strands hints for today's puzzle you need to progress at your preferred pace.

SEE ALSO: Wordle today: Answer, hints for February 5, 2026 SEE ALSO: NYT Connections hints today: Clues, answers for February 5, 2026 NYT Strands hint for today’s theme: Quint-essential

The words are related to numbers.

Today’s NYT Strands theme plainly explained

These words describe bundles of the same number.

NYT Strands spangram hint: Is it vertical or horizontal?

Today's NYT Strands spangram is vertical.

NYT Strands spangram answer today

Today's spangram is Give Me Five

NYT Strands word list for February 5

• Weekdays

• Vowels

• Toes

• Oceans

• Give Me Five

• Senses

• Boroughs

Looking for other daily online games? Mashable's Games page has more hints, and if you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now!

Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Not the day you're after? Here's the solution to yesterday's Strands.

Today's Wordle answer should be easy to solve if you're a birdwatcher.

If you just want to be told today's word, you can jump to the bottom of this article for today's Wordle solution revealed. But if you'd rather solve it yourself, keep reading for some clues, tips, and strategies to assist you.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Play games on Mashable SEE ALSO: NYT Connections hints today: Clues, answers for February 5, 2026 Where did Wordle come from?

Originally created by engineer Josh Wardle as a gift for his partner, Wordle rapidly spread to become an international phenomenon, with thousands of people around the globe playing every day. Alternate Wordle versions created by fans also sprang up, including battle royale Squabble, music identification game Heardle, and variations like Dordle and Quordle that make you guess multiple words at once. 

Wordle eventually became so popular that it was purchased by the New York Times, and TikTok creators even livestream themselves playing.

What's the best Wordle starting word?

The best Wordle starting word is the one that speaks to you. But if you prefer to be strategic in your approach, we have a few ideas to help you pick a word that might help you find the solution faster. One tip is to select a word that includes at least two different vowels, plus some common consonants like S, T, R, or N.

What happened to the Wordle archive?

The entire archive of past Wordle puzzles was originally available for anyone to enjoy whenever they felt like it, but it was later taken down, with the website's creator stating it was done at the request of the New York Times. However, the New York Times then rolled out its own Wordle Archive, available only to NYT Games subscribers.

Is Wordle getting harder?

It might feel like Wordle is getting harder, but it actually isn't any more difficult than when it first began. You can turn on Wordle's Hard Mode if you're after more of a challenge, though.

SEE ALSO: NYT Pips hints, answers for February 5, 2026 Here's a subtle hint for today's Wordle answer:

To dive.

Does today's Wordle answer have a double letter?

The letter O appears twice.

Today's Wordle is a 5-letter word that starts with...

Today's Wordle starts with the letter S.

SEE ALSO: Wordle-obsessed? These are the best word games to play IRL. The Wordle answer today is...

Get your last guesses in now, because it's your final chance to solve today's Wordle before we reveal the solution.

Drumroll please!

The solution to today's Wordle is...

SWOOP

Don't feel down if you didn't manage to guess it this time. There will be a new Wordle for you to stretch your brain with tomorrow, and we'll be back again to guide you with more helpful hints.

Are you also playing NYT Strands? See hints and answers for today's Strands.

SEE ALSO: NYT Connections Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for February 5, 2026

Reporting by Chance Townsend, Caitlin Welsh, Sam Haysom, Amanda Yeo, Shannon Connellan, Cecily Mauran, Mike Pearl, and Adam Rosenberg contributed to this article.

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Not the day you're after? Here's the solution to yesterday's Wordle.

Rumors are swirling that Anthropic is close to releasing Claude Sonnet 5, a new version of its mid-tier AI model that could significantly shift the competitive landscape for large language models.

Multiple reports published in early February suggest Claude Sonnet 5 is imminent, with some industry watchers pointing to signs of internal testing and quiet rollout preparation. While Anthropic has not formally announced a release date, speculation intensified after developers and analysts began referencing "Sonnet 5" in public forums and social posts.

SEE ALSO: Anthropic Super Bowl LX ads mock ChatGPT

According to UCStrategies, Claude Sonnet 5 is expected to deliver major performance gains while maintaining the pricing structure that has made Sonnet attractive to developers. The outlet reports that the model may match or exceed the capabilities of Anthropic’s higher-end Opus 4.5 model while remaining significantly cheaper to run, a combination that could make it especially appealing for enterprise and coding workloads.

Cost efficiency appears to be a central theme. Coverage from Geeky Gadgets suggests Sonnet 5 could cost roughly half as much as Opus 4.5, while offering faster inference and stronger agent-style capabilities, including improved context retention and multitasking. That positions the model as a direct challenger not just to Anthropic’s own lineup, but also to OpenAI's and Google’s upcoming releases.

There are also rumors that Claude Sonnet 5 will deepen its integration with Claude Code, Anthropic’s developer-focused environment. Several analysts cited by UCStrategies speculate that the model could outperform Opus in coding tasks, particularly in long-running workflows that benefit from sustained context and structured reasoning.

Based on the weekend’s viral hype around AI agents, you’d be forgiven for thinking we’re inching closer to a Cyberpunk future once reserved for sci-fi books and video games. And while that trajectory may be real, we’re also nowhere near full-blown cyber-dystopia just yet.

Still, the tech world has found something new to fixate on. As of now, it's a website called Rentahuman.ai, where humans can quite literally sell their labor to AI agents. The Rent-a-Human platform was created by crypto software engineer Alexander Liteplo after the sudden success of OpenClaw and Moltbook, and it proudly bills itself as "the meatspace layer for AI." (Mashable reached out to Liteplo for comment but did not receive a response.)

Think TaskRabbit, but for autonomous agents that need humans to do physical-world tasks they can’t.

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Rent-a-Human launched quietly over the weekend before exploding in visibility after Liteplo began aggressively promoting it on X. According to the site, more than 81,000 "rentable humans" have already signed up to offer paid services to bots, at the time of this writing. The actual tasks, at least for now, seem limited. The tasks themselves range from mundane errands like picking up packages to holding signs or delivering flowers to Anthropic.

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. Is Rent-A-Human a joke? Rent-a-Human's meat marketplace reportedly has 80,000 signups. Credit: Screenshot courtesy of Rent-a-Human

It’s also hard to tell whether Rent-a-Human is meant as satire or a sincere attempt at a new labor market, but the signs point to the latter. Crypto culture doesn't have the best reputation, and the site doesn’t do much to signal a wink. As Gizmodo pointed out in its coverage, phrases like "meatspace" and copy that reads "robots need your body" feel less like a joke and more like someone earnestly pitching Neuromancer as a startup deck.

Furthermore, it appears the site is part of a fast-growing ecosystem of AI agent tools that have exploded in popularity over the last few weeks, many of them orbiting around the open-source assistant formerly known as Clawdbot, then Moltbot, and now OpenClaw. As Mashable’s Timothy Beck Werth reported, the open-source OpenClaw project has gone viral among AI power users, despite repeated name changes prompted by trademark pressure from Anthropic.

SEE ALSO: OpenClaw Moltbook: What it is and how it works

As Mashable has documented across coverage of OpenClaw and its offshoots, projects like Rent-a-Human and Moltbook are built quickly through vibe coding, with creators openly admitting they ship code they don’t fully review, relying on AI models to fix bugs later.

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Whether it actually works is another question. While the platform claims tens of thousands of humans have signed up, Gizmodo reports that only a small fraction have connected payment wallets, and there are far fewer active AI agents than available workers (82 agents to 81,000 humans).

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

Rent-a-Human requires users to connect crypto wallets in order to get paid, and payments are handled entirely in cryptocurrency, including stablecoins and Ethereum. That alone raises obvious red flags, especially for a platform asking people to perform real-world tasks for anonymous AI agents with no meaningful verification process.

The site’s design places a lot of trust on both sides of the transaction, with very little protection in place for the human doing the work. Tasks are posted by bots or bot operators who may not be identifiable, payments are non-reversible once sent, and users are expected to operate through crypto wallets that could be compromised if mishandled.

Unsurprisingly, many crypto enthusiasts are fully on board. Rentahuman has been heavily promoted by crypto and AI agent accounts on X, many of whom frame it as an inevitable step toward autonomous economies in which bots transact directly with humans. That enthusiasm doesn’t do much to calm concerns, especially given the crypto industry’s long history of rug pulls.

It's too soon to tell for sure whether Rent-a-Human is the start of a new AI gig worker economy or a very elaborate satire, but as with the overnight success of Moltbook, proceed with caution.

SAVE $60: The Ninja Foodi PossibleCooker Pro is on sale for $109.99 at Amazon, down from the list price of $169.99. That's a 35% discount.

Opens in a new window Credit: Ninja Ninja Foodi PossibleCooker Pro $109.99 at Amazon
$169.99 Save $60.00   Get Deal

We're coming up on one of the most important snack days of the year in the U.S. This Sunday marks the Big Game, which is awesome if you love football. If you don't care about the sport, there's still a case for attending parties because they almost always come with excellent snacks. If you're looking for an easy way to prep foods, check out this deal at Amazon.

As of Feb. 4, the Ninja Foodi PossibleCooker Pro is on sale at Amazon for $109.99, marked down from the list price of $169.99. That's a 35% discount that shaves $60 off the standard price.

With an 8.5-quart capacity and eight cooking functions, the Ninja Foodi PossibleCooker Pro is a kitchen hack for making easy game-day snacks or dinners on busy nights. It functions as a super fancy Crock Pot with functions like slow cook, steam, braise, bake, proof, keep warm, and more. Plus, Ninja makes some of our favorite kitchen appliances so you know you're in for something that's well worth the space on the countertop.

SEE ALSO: Super Bowl 2026 deals: Score free food from Applebee's, Buffalo Wild Wings, Denny’s, Popeyes, and more

The removable cooking pot in the Ninja Foodi PossibleCooker Pro is easy to lift out for serving directly from the pot. But it's also oven safe up to 500 degrees Fahrenheit, so you can get perfectly crispy dips from the Ninja Foodi. Plus, the pot has a non-stick surface for easy cleaning.

Before kickoff on Sunday, get equipped in the kitchen thanks to the Ninja Foodi PossibleCooker Pro. It's on sale for under $110 at Amazon and it'll come in handy night after night for quick one-pot dinners.

TL;DR: Enjoy a PC refresh for only $19.97 with this Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows license.

Opens in a new window Credit: Microsoft Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows $19.97
$229 Save $209.03   Get Deal

Not all major upgrades have to be expensive. In fact, a Microsoft Office license can give your PC an impressive refresh with seven helpful apps for less than $3 each. While it sounds too good to be true, you can now secure this Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows lifetime license for just $19.97.

If you’ve been in the market for a new PC, it may be time to just give your old one some new tools. This Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows license equips your device with seven apps, including some of the brand’s classic staples, that are geared to help you with work, play, and everything in between.

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Curious what’s included? You’ll get access to the classics like Word to help you draft documents, and Excel for all your spreadsheet needs. If you need to create a presentation, you’ll have PowerPoint at your disposal, and Outlook helps you manage your email communications.

This license also includes newer favorites like Publisher, which can help you design professional documents. Access can help you manage large databases, and OneNote can improve how you take notes. This Microsoft Office license gives you permanent access to each app, with no subscription fees required, and you can work offline as needed.

If the year of this edition gives you pause, don’t worry — the apps have been redesigned and will include enhanced features like enhanced inking in all Office programs, new PowerPoint presentation tools, new Excel analysis capabilities, and updated email and contact management in Outlook.

Give your PC an upgrade with this Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows license, now just $19.97.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

TL;DR: The Sterling Stock Picker uses OpenAI-powered insights to help investors evaluate stocks based on risk, growth, and personal goals. For a limited time, the lifetime subscription is $55.19 instead of $486, through Feb. 15 at 11:59 p.m. PT.

Opens in a new window Credit: Sterling Stock Picker Sterling Stock Picker: Lifetime Subscription $55.19
$486 Save $430.81   Get Deal

Markets can react poorly to uncertainty, and there has been no shortage of it lately. For investors who want clearer signals without spending too much time analyzing charts and financial statements, Sterling Stock Picker offers a more structured approach to decision-making. For a limited time, the lifetime subscription is available for $55.19 (reg. $486) through Feb. 15 at 11:59 p.m. PT.

Sterling Stock Picker is anchored by its patent-pending North Star system, which evaluates stocks and categorizes them as buy, sell, hold, or avoid based on key financial metrics and risk factors. The platform also spotlights Stock Rockets — companies posting more than 50% quarterly revenue growth — helping users identify high-momentum opportunities at a glance.

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Your personal AI coach is Finley, backed by OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT. Finley can answer questions about individual stocks, portfolio performance, or broader market trends using real-time data. A short questionnaire personalizes recommendations based on goals, values, and risk tolerance, while a Done-For-You Portfolio option offers a more hands-off way to get started.

This setup caters to a broad spectrum of investors. Novices can tap into educational explanations to understand why certain stocks are flagged, while experienced users will appreciate consolidated portfolio insights and risk assessments. The community forum adds another dimension, offering a place to discuss strategy and learn from fellow investors, so there’s no need to hunt down advice on outside message boards.

Sterling Stock Picker focuses on stock selection and portfolio strategy rather than broader financial planning, and users looking for advanced derivatives or day-trading tools may find it limited. Still, for those interested in more deliberate, data-informed investing, the current discount lowers the barrier to entry.

The Sterling Stock Picker lifetime subscription is available for $55.19 (reg. $486) through Feb. 15 at 11:59 p.m. PT, offering an affordable way to test an OpenAI-powered approach to stock research and portfolio building.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

Luxury and frugality don’t usually go hand in hand. Most people assume a luxury vehicle comes with indulgence, not savings—but some SUVs are proving you can have both.

Valentine’s Day is only a week away (and hallelujah, it’s on a weekend this year). As one of Mashable’s sex and dating experts, my apartment is basically a revolving door of delivery boxes filled with the latest pleasure tech. I see most of these products months before they even launch, so I have a pretty good idea of what's worth your money and what's not.

Because I track pricing year-round, I can tell you which Valentine's "sales" are legit and which ones are just standard prices with a red bow on top. Now that we’re approaching the biggest vibrator sales day of the year, I’m sharing the best discounts you can grab right now.

SEE ALSO: Lovehoney has tons of V-Day goodies on sale: Get 50% off vibrators, lingerie, and more

You’ll notice most of these links go directly to the brands rather than Amazon. While I love Prime for convenience, buying direct is the best way to guarantee you’re getting a safe, authentic product — plus, the direct-to-consumer sales are usually stronger for V-Day anyway.

With that said, here are the best sex toy sales to shop right now. I’ll keep adding to this list as we get closer to the big day.

Lovehoney: Get up to 70% off everything

Lovehoney has a little bit of everything for everyone. Its toys are affordable (there’s almost always a sale going on), reputable (it’s one of the largest online retailers out there), and diverse — you can find everything from strap-ons to clit vibrators to bondage gear. Right now, the brand is throwing a huge Valentine's sale with up to 70% off sitewide. That means almost every item on the site is marked down, so there’s no excuse not to get a little something for your partner (or yourself).

What to buy: Looking to get the best bang for your buck? I recommend splurging on the Lovehoney Romance Gift Set. It includes 12 items, like the We-Vibe Jive 2 (which is worth $139 alone) and fun accessories, for just $99. That’s a 69% discount (a pretty good number, right?).

Opens in a new window Credit: Lovehoney Lovehoney Romance Gift Set (12 Piece) $99 at Lovehoney
$321.88 Save $222.88   Get Deal Opens in a new window Credit: Lovehoney Lovehoney Rose Glow Pleasure Air Toy $62.99 at Lovehoney
$69.99 Save $7.00   Get Deal Good Vibes: Get up to 15% off sitewide (ends Feb. 4!) + 70% off clearance

Good Vibes usually has some pretty solid deals, but this year, the brand is being strict about the Valentine’s Day cutoff. Right now, you can take 15% off sitewide, but that deal technically ends Feb. 4. As long as you order by this evening, your stash will arrive by V-Day (shipping is free on orders of $85+). If you miss the deadline, you can still get it in time with second-day shipping if you order by Feb. 10. And of course, the clearance section is still stacked with items up to 70% off.

What to buy: There are honestly so, so many delicious options at Good Vibes, and what you buy really depends on the kind of night you’re trying to have, but here are some of the best deals that caught my eye:

• Good Vibes Valentine’s Pleasure Bundle — $95 $170 (save $75)

• Good Vibes Radiant Rose — $48.99 $69.99 (save $21)

• Candy Heart Dildo — $59.49 $69.99 (save $10.50)

Hello Nancy: Get up to 50% off select items

If you’re looking for something a little more discreet than a Candy Heart Dildo (it’s cute, but I get it), I highly recommend shopping Hello Nancy’s Valentine’s Day Sale before it’s over. The brand is offering up to 50% off select toys, and you don't even need a coupon code.

What to buy: The cutest toy I own is the Lem (it looks like a lemon, hence the name), and right now you can snag it for $89 ($70 off). This adorable device is all over social media for a reason: It’s super powerful, whisper-quiet, and uses air-pulse technology to make you come over and over again. It also makes for a great Galentine's Day gift — your bestie will love it (I gave one to my sister).

Opens in a new window Credit: Hello Nancy Lem Clitoral Massager $89 at Hello Nancy
$159 Save $70   Get Deal Opens in a new window Credit: Hello Nancy Berri Edging Clitoral Massager $95 at Hello Nancy
$189 Save $94 Get 25% off with code BERRI25 Get Deal Le Wand: Get up to 30% off with code LWVDAY30 + 85% off clearance

Le Wand is known for its luxe wand vibrators, but the brand sells so much more than that, and right now you can take 30% off best-sellers with code LWVDAY30, which brings plenty of saucy gifts down to under $25. And if you’re really pinching pennies, the clearance section is currently seeing price cuts as deep as 85% off.

What to buy: Almost everything in Le Wand’s sale is add-to-cart-worthy. To help you choose, I’ve handpicked some of the best deals:

• The Rose Suction Vibrator — $14.99 $99.99 (save $85)

• Heart Suction Vibe — $28 $69.99 (save $41.99)

• Le Wand Point — $36.99 $129.99 (save $93)

More Valentine's Day sex toy deals

Here's a shortlist of other sidewide sales to have on your radar.

Opens in a new window Credit: Adam & Eve Adam & Eve Valentine's Day Sale Get 50% off two items with code REWARD50, plus half-off shipping. Shop Now Opens in a new window Credit: Babeland Babeland Valentine's Day Sale Get 15% off sitewide, plus up to 70% off clearance. Shop Now Opens in a new window Credit: b-Vibe b-Vibe Valentine's Day Sale Get 30% off with code BLOVE30, plus up to 85% off clearance. Shop Now Opens in a new window Credit: Boutique Voila Boutique Voila Valentine's Day Sale Get up to 60% off select sex toys. Shop Now Opens in a new window Credit: bellesa boutique bellesa boutique Valentine's Day Sale Get up to 60% off + FREE AirVibe & Rose! (on orders $89+). Shop Now Opens in a new window Credit: biird biird's Clearance Sale Get up to 40% off best sellers. Shop Now Opens in a new window Credit: The Handy The Handy Get $30 off The Handy masturbator. Get Deal Opens in a new window Credit: KIIROO KIIROO Valentine's Day Sale Get up to 25% off select toys. Shop Now

Today's the big day: Home Assistant 2026.2 is now rolling out. It includes a new default Home Dashboard, a redesigned quick search, opt-in data collection for the new device database, and much more.

Google looks to be adding AI to yet another popular Google product. In a new test, Gemini appears in a popular crowdsourced Google Maps feature.

As first discovered by Android Authority, Google is working on a chatbot conversation-style overhaul of the community edits feature.

Currently, users can click on "Suggest an edit" within Google Maps to submit relevant information about a location. For example, users can suggest an edit for a business and add updated store hours or correct a website URL related to the business. To do this, users navigate dropdown menus and input information into text boxes. Google then reviews the edits before pushing them live. With the crowdsourced feature, Google Maps is able to provide the most up-to-date information about locations to its users.

However, with the new Gemini-powered feature that's currently undergoing testing, "Suggest an edit" will receive a revamp that brings Gemini to the feature and provides a chatbot-type workflow. Users will be able to use natural language to share new information about locations and businesses, meaning they can provide the information as if they were having a conversation with another person. 

Gemini will even ask follow-up questions related to the crowdsourced information shared by Google Maps users. In the example provided by Android Authority, a user informs Gemini through the "Suggest an edit" feature that the opening hours for the Eiffel Tower are incorrectly listed. Gemini asks the user for the correct hours and then submits the info to Google once the user provides the chatbot with their answer.

This may not seem like a big change, but it is a significant update to a crucial feature in Google Maps. 

In recent weeks, Google has been updating various products across the company — from Google Search and now to Google Maps — in order to directly add Gemini-powered AI features. Google clearly wants to make Gemini a standard part of all of the company's services instead of a standalone product that consumers can choose to avoid.

As streaming has become the preferred way to listen to music, buying physical CDs has grown less common. Yet this isn’t new; physical music purchases began to decline when digital downloads became available through services like iTunes.

Visual Studio Code releases major updates once a month, and right on schedule, version 1.109 is now rolling out to desktop platforms. It's the continuation of Microsoft's push for making VS Code "the home for multi-agent development," but there are some non-AI improvements as well.

In a segment crowded with practical four-doors, one affordable family sedan has quietly built a reputation for reliability that outpaces many of its rivals. While competitors focus on style, tech, or brand prestige, this model delivers consistently dependable performance and low ownership costs, making it a smart choice for buyers who want peace of mind alongside everyday usability.