1988–1995: Early work and Sista (pictured in 2012, far right) helped define her sound and the two have continued working together for decades In 1988, Elliott formed an all-women
R&B group called Fayze (later renamed Sista) with friends La'Shawn Shellman, Chonita Coleman, and Radiah Scott. She was introduced to her neighborhood friend
Timothy Mosley (Timbaland) by
Melvin Barcliff (Magoo) who was trying to recruit Timbaland to be the group's
producer and began making demo tracks, among them included the 1991 promo "First Move". Later in 1991, Fayze caught the attention of
Jodeci member and producer
DeVante Swing Elliott took Mosley & Barclif whom DeVante re-christened the duo as
Timbaland & Magoo. All 20-plus members of the Swing Mob—among them future stars such as
Ginuwine,
Playa, and
Tweet—lived in a single two-story house in New York and were often at work on material both for Jodeci and their own projects.
1996–1998: Supa Dupa Fly After leaving Swing Mob, Elliott and Timbaland worked together as a songwriting/production team, crafting tracks for acts including
SWV,
702, and most notably
Aaliyah. The success was also a result of the music videos of her single releases, which were directed by
Harold "Hype" Williams, who created many groundbreaking hip hop, Afro-futuristic videos at the time. The album was nominated for Best Rap Album at the
1998 Grammy Awards, but lost to
Puff Daddy's
No Way Out. The year also saw Elliott perform live at the
MTV Video Music Awards show on a remix to
Lil' Kim's "
Ladies Night" with fellow rappers
Da Brat,
Angie Martinez and
TLC-rapper
Left Eye. Elliott continued her successful career in the background as a producer and writer on
Total's single "Trippin'", as well as working with several others in the hip-hop and
R&B communities. Elliott co-wrote and co-produced two tracks on
Whitney Houston's 1998 album
My Love Is Your Love, providing vocal cameos for "In My Business" and "Oh Yes". Elliott also produced and made a guest appearance on
Spice Girl Melanie Brown's debut solo single, "I Want You Back", which topped the
UK Singles Chart in Brown's native United Kingdom and is Elliott's only chart-topping song in that country.
1999–2001: Da Real World and Miss E... So Addictive Although a much darker album than her debut, Elliott's second album was just as successful as the first, selling 1.5 million copies and 3 million copies worldwide. She remarked, "I can't even explain the pressure. The last album took me a week to record. This one took almost two months...I couldn't rush it the second time because people expect more." A music video was filmed for the remix, shot in black and white and featuring a cameo appearance by Dogg. The Desert Storm Remix is acclaimed by music critics and became a cult remix . Missy Elliott next released
Miss E... So Addictive on May 15, 2001. The album debuted at number two in the United States and sold 250,000 copies in its first week. It spawned the massive pop and urban hits "
One Minute Man" (as to which MTV wrote: "Missy Elliott Plays
Dr. Ruth On New Single"), featuring
Ludacris and
Trina, and "
Get Ur Freak On", as well as the international
club hit "
4 My People" and the less commercially successful single "
Take Away". The double music video for "Take Away/4 My People" was released in the fall of 2001, shortly after the sudden death of Elliott's close friend Aaliyah on August 25 and the
9/11 terrorist attacks. The "Take Away" video contained images of and words about Aaliyah, and the slow ballad acted as a tribute to her memory. The remainder of the video was the more upbeat "4 My People", contained scenes of people dancing happily in front of American flags and Elliott dressed in red, white and blue. Though "Take Away" was not a success on radio, "4 My People" went on to become an American and European
club hit due to a popular remix by
house music duo
Basement Jaxx in 2002.
Tweet's appearance on Elliott's "Take Away" as well as her cameo at Elliott's house on
MTV Cribs helped to create a buzz about the new R&B singer. Tweet's own debut single, "Oops (Oh My)", was co-written by Elliott and released through Goldmind in February 2002. The single was a top ten hit, thanks partially to Elliott's songwriting and guest rap, and to Timbaland's unusual production on the track. Elliott co-produced the
Christina Aguilera,
Lil' Kim,
Mýa and
Pink cover of "
Lady Marmalade" for the album ''
Moulin Rouge! Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film, which went to number one on the Billboard''
Hot 100 in 2001.
2002–2004: Under Construction and This Is Not a Test! For her next outing, Elliott and Timbaland focused on an old school sound, utilizing many old school rap and funk samples, such as
Run–DMC's "Peter Piper" and
Frankie Smith's "Double Dutch Bus". Elliott's fourth album, 2002's
Under Construction (see
2002 in music) is known as the best selling women rap album with 2.1 million copies sold in the United States. In 2002, Elliott won a Grammy Award for Best Rap Solo Performance for "Get Ur Freak On".
The New York Times designated
Under Construction "this year's best hip-hop album". Elliott released two singles off of
Under Construction. The lead single, "
Work It" reached No. 2 on
Billboards Hot 100 chart and won the "Video of the Year" award at
MTV's Video Music Awards. The second single, "
Gossip Folks" featuring
Ludacris, became a Top 10 hit on
Billboards Hot 100 chart, was one of the most-played music videos on
MTV,
MTV2,
MTV Jams, and
BET in 2003 and was embraced by the dance community, as well as the mainstream, due to a
Fatboy Slim remix. A third single was never released, though a video was shot for "
Back In The Day" featuring
Jay-Z and Elliott. In between albums, Elliott produced the "American Dream Remix" (featuring Tweet's additional vocals) of
Madonna's single "American Life", was featured rapper on Timbaland & Magoo's return single, "
Cop That Shit", and produced "Fighting Temptation" (featuring herself, Beyoncé,
Free and
MC Lyte) for the soundtrack to the
Cuba Gooding Jr. and
Beyoncé Knowles movie of the same name. The track reached No. 1 in Japan but failed to chart in the U.S. Hot 100. Elliott was also featured on
Wyclef Jean's "
Party to Damascus" and
Ghostface Killah's "
Tush" singles, the latter of which became a minor 2004 dance hit, and had a pivotal role in the film
Honey.
Gap approached Elliott later in the year to co-star in a commercial with Madonna, which received much media attention. Elliott furthered her relationship with Madonna by performing the controversial 2003
MTV Video Music Awards show opening alongside Madonna,
Britney Spears and
Christina Aguilera. Also in September 2003, Elliott performed the theme song "The Opposite Sex" for the
UPN sitcom
Eve starring her good friend and fellow rapper
Eve. It lasted for three seasons. A year after Elliott's most successful album to date was released, Elliott felt pressured by her label to release another album hoping to capitalize on her recent success. Elliott's singles, "
Pass That Dutch" and "
I'm Really Hot", from her fifth album,
This Is Not a Test! (released November 2003), both rose the urban charts. However, both were not as successful at pop radio in comparison to many of her previous efforts.
This Is Not A Test sold 690,000 copies in the United States In 2004, Elliott was featured on
Ciara's hit single "
1, 2 Step", with her verse interpolating
Teena Marie's single, "Square Biz". Elliott premiered her own reality show on the
UPN Network,
The Road to Stardom with Missy Elliott in 2005 even though it was not renewed for a second season. During the late 1990s and early 2000s, she sold more than 7.6 million copies in the United States, being a woman rapper with best-selling albums in the country, followed by
Lauryn Hill (seven million),
Lil' Kim (four million), and
Eve (four million) at the time. In honor of her career, many artists performed some of her biggest hits. Timbaland and
Tweet performed "The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)",
Eve and
Keyshia Cole performed "
Hot Boyz" and "Work It",
Fatman Scoop and
Ciara performed "Lose Control", and
Nelly Furtado performed "Get Ur Freak On (The Remix)". Since 2007, Elliott's seventh
studio album has had several different forms with extensive delays. In 2007, she worked with Timbaland,
Swizz Beatz,
Danja,
T-Pain and
DJ Toomp and planned to release an album at the beginning of 2008. In January 2008, "
Ching-a-Ling" was released as the lead single for the
Step Up 2: The Streets soundtrack, which also featured "
Shake Your Pom Pom" produced by Timbaland. Elliott released the song "
Best, Best" in the same year and renamed the albums previous title
FANomenal to its tentative title
Block Party. She later decided against
Block Party and four years later, in 2012, Elliott released two Timbaland-produced singles ("
9th Inning" and "
Triple Threat") exclusively to iTunes. Though the songs managed to chart on
Billboard Hot Digital Songs, in an interview with Yahoo's The Yo Show, Missy talked about her hiatus from making records: "Your brain needs time to refresh! Things happen in your life where you can then write something else instead of the same three topics. Like, how many times we gonna talk about the club? I gotta feel like what I'm giving the fans is 100 percent and that it's game-changing. I don't just throw out microwave records." In between the recording of her seventh album, Missy Elliott found success behind the scenes. Elliott's writing and production helped her reach No. 1 on
Billboards
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs with
Keyshia Cole's "Let It Go" (2007),
Jazmine Sullivan's "Need U Bad" (2008), and
Monica's "Everything to Me" (2010). Since 2008, songs written and/or produced by Elliott for
Fantasia ("Free Yourself"),
Jennifer Hudson ("I'm His Only Woman"),
Monica ("Everything to Me"),
Keyshia Cole ("Let It Go"), and
Jazmine Sullivan ("Need U Bad" and "Holding You Down (Goin' in Circles)") have all received
Grammy nominations. Both Fantasia's "Free Yourself" (2005) and Sullivan's "Holding You Down (Goin' In Circles)" reached No. 3 on
Billboards
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. In mid-2010, Elliott embarked on a two-part tour with stops in Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia, while she also performed at VH1's "Hip Hop Honors: The Dirty South" in a tribute to Timbaland, performing "
Get Ur Freak On" and
"Work It". In 2008 she made an appearance in "
Whatcha Think About That" by
The Pussycat Dolls, and performed live in different places with them. In 2011 and 2012, Elliott made guest appearances on "All Night Long" by
Demi Lovato, "
Nobody's Perfect" by
J. Cole, the remix of "
Why Stop Now" by
Busta Rhymes with
Chris Brown and
Lil Wayne, and a remix of
Katy Perry's "
Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)" that helped catapult "T.G.I.F". to No. 1 on the
Billboard Hot 100. She also produced
Monica's singles "Anything (To Find You)" and "Until It's Gone". Throughout 2013, Missy Elliott was featured on
Eve's album cut "Wanna Be", as well as international artists singles,
Little Mix's "
How Ya Doin'?" and "
NiLiria" with K-pop musician
G-Dragon, which was named by
Complex magazine as one of the "50 Best Songs of 2013". Elliott also contributed to her protégée
Sharaya J's two releases, "Banji" and "Smash Up The Place/Snatch Yo Wigs". In December 2013, Elliott received a
Grammy nomination with
Fantasia and
Kelly Rowland for their song "
Without Me". As early as July 2013, Missy Elliott and Timbaland held recording sessions for
Kat Dahlia's debut,
My Garden (2015). In August 2013, R&B singer
Faith Evans revealed that Missy Elliott would be featured on her sixth studio album, tentatively titled
Incomparable. In March 2014, Evans revealed one of the tracks was named "
I Deserve It", featuring Missy and her protégée
Sharaya J, in which Evans cited it as a "banger" and "feel good" record. Evans also revealed that in total Elliott contributed three tracks to her album. On July 29, 2014, a snippet of a Missy Elliott–produced song, nickname "I Love Him", premiered on Monica's official
Instagram account.
2015–2018: Super Bowl XLIX halftime show and singles In 2015, Elliott performed at the
Super Bowl XLIX halftime show with
Katy Perry. Elliott performed a medley of "Get Ur Freak On", "Work It", and "Lose Control". The performance was well-received, and boosted digital sales of Elliott's work that week, with a twenty-five-fold increase in album sales (to 2,000 units) and a ten-fold increase in sales of the three songs she performed (to 71,000 units) compared to the week before. It also became the most watched Super Bowl halftime show in NFL history, receiving 118.5 million viewers in the United States. On February 3, 2015, it was confirmed that Elliott would be a feature on the upcoming remix to
Diplo and
Skrillex's "
Take Ü There". On February 11, Elliott stated that she was still in the process of recording her seventh studio album,
Block Party, with Timbaland. On April 2, 2015,
Pharrell Williams confirmed that he was working on Elliott's album during an episode of
The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. On November 12, 2015, "
WTF (Where They From)" and its music video were simultaneously released to digital outlets. By November 19, the song and its video had been streamed 6.1 million times in the US alone, with an additional count of 16 million views per YouTube viewing. On February 7, 2016, the day of the
fiftieth Super Bowl, Elliott released a promotional single, "Pep Rally". Later that month, Elliott reunited with former protégée
Tweet and frequent collaborator Timbaland on the cut "Somebody Else Will" taken from the former's third studio album,
Charlene. By March 15, 2016, First Lady
Michelle Obama proclaimed that she had assembled a collaborative track featuring vocals from Missy Elliott,
Kelly Clarkson,
Janelle Monáe and
Zendaya alongside production credit from pop songwriter
Diane Warren and Elliott titled "This Is for My Girls". The
iTunes-exclusive record will be used to both coincide with Ms. Obama's
SXSW speech and to promote her third-world educational initiative
Let Girls Learn. Elliott announced plans to release a documentary chronicling her impact on the production scene in both audio and video. The midnight of January 27, 2017, saw the full-length release to a new Elliott single titled "
I'm Better", featuring production and vocal assistance from recurring sideman
Lamb and shared directing credit by Elliott and longtime colleague
Dave Meyers. In July 2018, Missy Elliott teased fans by appearing on a snippet nicknamed "ID" by
Skrillex, released in 2023 as RATATA. One month later, Elliott appeared on the
Ariana Grande number "Borderline", taken from the singer's fourth studio album
Sweetener (2018). In October 2018, Elliott announced that she is working on her new album, which would be released in 2019. On March 20, 2019,
Lizzo released a collaboration with Elliott titled "Tempo".
2019–present: EP, further collaborations, and Out Of This World tour On June 13, 2019, Elliott was inducted to the
Songwriters Hall of Fame, becoming the first female rapper to receive this honor. Elliott received an
honorary Doctor of Music degree from
Berklee College of Music, and the
Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award. She was also the first female rapper to receive the award. Elliott received the
Women's Entrepreneurship Day Music Pioneer Award at the United Nations in 2019 in recognition for her achievements in music and being a leader. This award was placed in the Congressional Record. Elliott released her first
extended play on August 23, 2019, titled
Iconology. The five-track EP features a variety of musical genres that cover the breadth of her career as an artist and has received favorable reviews from critics. Upon release of the album, she also released the lead single, "
Throw It Back", with a music video featuring
Teyana Taylor. Musically,
Iconology is a
pop,
hip hop and
R&B EP reminiscent of Elliott's previous work. The opening track, "
Throw It Back" contains "
trap snares and a serpentine bassline", which along with the second track, "Cool Off", were described as "woozy, futuristic romps" containing "distorted bass lines and frenetic production". Lyrically, "Throw It Back" contains references to Elliott's history, as well as previous collaborators
Tweet and
Heavy D. Maura Johnson of
Entertainment Weekly described "Cool Off" as calling "back to hip-hop's two-turntables-and-a-mic early days". "DripDemeanor" has been described as a slow jam that explores Elliott's "sensuous side". Musically, it contains "plush synths [that] skip-step underneath" the song's beat. "Why I Still Love You" is a
doo-wop song with
gospel influences and jazz influence that lyrically chronicles the singer's "conflicted emotions about holding on to a cheating lover". The EP closes with an
a cappella version of "Why I Still Love You". Elliott was motivated to write uplifting music to counter mainstream trends and encourage more
dance music to feel good. "DripDemeanor" was released as the album's second single on October 22. "Why I Still Love You" was released as the third single on January 17, 2020. "Cool Off" was released as the fourth and final single from the EP on April 21, 2020. On June 26, 2020, Elliott appeared on the official remix to
Toni Braxton's single "
Do It". Elliott co-produced the track alongside Hannon Lane. On August 13, 2020, Elliott appeared on the remix single "
Levitating" by
Dua Lipa which also featured
Madonna. The remix was produced by
the Blessed Madonna. Unlike Madonna, Elliott appeared in the video. The music video was directed by Will Hooper. On January 11, 2021, Elliott appeared on the single "ATM" by
Bree Runway. She directed the music video for "
Twerkulator" by the
City Girls in July 2021. On February 17, 2023, Elliott appeared on the track "RATATA" produced by
Skrillex and
Mr. Oizo, the second track on Skrillex's LP "Quest For Fire". This release confirmed rumors from 2018 regarding this collaboration, On March 23, 2023, British group
Flo released the single "Fly Girl", featuring Elliott; the song interpolates Elliott's "
Work It", plus new rap section. On April 8, 2024, Elliott announced “Out of This World: The Missy Elliott Experience Tour,” the rapper's first headlining tour of her career. The tour began on July 4 in
Vancouver, Canada and featured
Timbaland,
Busta Rhymes and
Ciara as its opening acts. In an October 2025 interview with
Rolling Stone, Elliott shared that she was working on new music, stating, "I have something in the works. It's just different. It's me being experimental again… I got some stuff coming. Some fire.” On April 10, 2026, singer
Kehlani released the single "Back and Forth", which features Elliott. == Other ventures ==