From friends to foes.
Kanye West and Jay-Z were once running the rap game with their profound lyrics and catchy beats. Now, the former collaborators are at odds as the “Donda” emcee continues to publicly lash out at the Roc Nation founder and his family.
Keep scrolling to see how their relationship has changed over the years.
Kanye West and Jay-Z begin a working relationship
West and Jay — born Shawn Carter — began a working relationship in 2000 when the Chicago-born emcee produced a track for Beanie Sigel, who was signed to Jay’s Roc-A-Fella Records.
The song impressed Roc-A-Fella Records co-founder Damon Dash and led to West becoming involved in Jay’s fifth studio album, “The Dynasty: Roc La Familia.”
Kanye West signs with Roc-A-Fella Records
Dash eventually signed West to Roc-A-Fella Records in 2002, primarily as a producer for the label.
Rumors surfaced that Jay didn’t want to sign West, and he addressed the speculation in 2009.
In an interview with XXL, Jay denied not wanting to sign West, saying: “Let’s first clear this thing about Dame and Kanye and all of us. We all had a conversation about Kanye and whether to sign him. No one knew what would become of Kanye. Not Dame, not me, not [Kareem Burke].
“So we all sat down and said, ‘Let’s at least sign so we can keep the tracks in-house. It’s only good business.’ And Dame said, ‘We can put [Beanie Sigel] and [Cam’ron], surround him and make this type of album.’ I wasn’t saying don’t sign Kanye; I was saying, at least keep the beats in-house, if anything.”
Kanye West storms VMA stage to defend Beyoncé
On September 13, 2009, a then-19-year-old Taylor Swift appeared in front of the audience at Radio City Music Hall to accept her award for best female music video for her hit “You Belong With Me” at the MTV VMAs.
Before the pop star could finish her speech, West crashed the stage and took the mic from her.
“Yo, Taylor, I’m really happy for you, I’ma let you finish, but Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time!” he said as Swift stood still.
The camera then panned to Beyoncé, whose jaw dropped in total shock.
Kanye West and Jay-Z release joint album ‘Watch the Throne’
On August 8, 2011, Jay and Ye released their joint album, “Watch the Throne.”
The project debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart and broke iTunes’ one-week sales record at that time.
Several hit singles spawned from the album, including “Otis,” “Lift Off,” “N–s in Paris” and “No Church In the Wild.”
The rappers then hit the road for their “Watch the Throne” tour, which kicked off in Atlanta in October 2011 and ended in June 2012.
At the time, sources reported that Jay and West were barely speaking to each other as they ironed out the details of their tour.
The sources said West wanted flashy concerts with “next-level production,” which would cost more than $400,000 per show, while Jay was said to be meticulous about costs and already has a larger, long-term advance from Live Nation that he has to pay back.
“Jay-Z can’t deal with Kanye,” an insider told Page Six. “Jay is a stone-cold businessman. He wants to recoup all of his money from Live Nation. But Kanye wants to upstage rock stars with a blowout show. He doesn’t care about costs. He has a lot less to gain from the shows.”
Jay-Z and Beyoncé skip Kanye West and Kim Kardashian’s wedding
West and Kim Kardashian tied the knot at the Forte di Belvedere in Florence, Italy, on May 24, 2014.
While several celebrities attended the nuptials, including John Legend, Chrissy Teigen, Jaden Smith, LaLa Anthony and Alexander Wang, notably absent was Jay and Beyoncé.
That same day, the “Drunk In Love” songstress took to Instagram, posting a kissy face selfie of herself wearing her iconic “Lemonade” braids.
The couple were reportedly spending their weekend in the Hamptons.
Despite their absence, Beyoncé congratulated the newlyweds on Instagram, writing, “Wishing you a lifetime of unconditional love. God bless your beautiful family 🐝.”
Kanye West supports Jay-Z’s TIDAL venture
West was one of many celebrities who supported Jay’s streaming business, TIDAL.
In March 2015, the “Flashing Lights” emcee joined Jay, Beyoncé, Madonna, J. Cole, Rihanna, Nicki Minaj and more onstage to help announce its debut.
The following year, West took to X (formerly known as Twitter), demanding that Apple CEO Tim Cook make a deal with Jay to acquire Tidal.
“Apple give Jay his check for Tidal now and stop trying to act like you Steve [Jobs],” he tweeted.
“This Tidal Apple beef is f–king up the music game. I need Tim Cook Jay Z Dez Jimmy Larry me and Drake Scooter on the phone or in a room this week!!!”
Kanye West goes off on Jay-Z
During an October 2016 performance, West went off on Jay because their kids hadn’t had a playdate.
A fan’s video from the concert in Seattle showed the rapper complaining about business disputes with Jay.
West also shut down the idea of releasing a “Watch the Throne 2” because “of the Tidal/Apple bulls–t” and slammed Jay for not checking on him and Kardashian after she was robbed in Paris.
“Don’t call me after the robbery and say, ‘How you feelin’?’ You wanna know how I’m feelin’? Come by the house … Bring the kids by the house like we brothers … Our kids ain’t never even played together,” he said.
Jay’s Roc-A-Fella Records co-founder Kareem “Biggs” Burke told Page Six at his “Reasonable Doubt” 20th anniversary pop-up shop/exhibition that month that he was “shocked to hear what Kanye said onstage.”
“The last I saw [West], he spoke really highly of Jay. I’m not sure about the relationship at this point. I spoke to Jay [after Kanye’s rant] and we’re both just like, ‘We miss the old Kanye,’” he said.
“From what I know of Kanye, he’s usually really honest. So it sounds like something he’s going through right now. He may [say] something like that, and then three weeks later he may be back to, ‘That’s my brother.’ But at this point, with everybody’s career, we’re a little too old for rap beef.”
A music insider told us that the rappers’ friendship was never what it seemed.
“Jay can’t stand him,” the source said. “He looks at him as this crazy, eccentric motherf–ker he can tolerate in small doses. Kanye is a nut job. Everyone knows that.”
Jay-Z addresses Kanye West’s onstage antics on ‘4:44’ album
Jay addressed West’s antics on his 13th studio album, “4:44,” which was released in June 2017.
“You dropped outta school, you lost your principles / I know people backstab you, I feel bad, too / But this ‘f–k everybody’ attitude ain’t natural,” he rapped on the album’s opening track, “Kill Jay-Z.”
“But you ain’t the same, this ain’t KumbaYe / But you got hurt because you did cool by ‘Ye / You gave him 20 million without blinkin’ / He gave you 20 minutes on stage, f–k was he thinkin’?” he added.
Kanye West claims Jay-Z’s TIDAL owed him millions
A few days after the release of “4:44,” West alleged that Jay’s TIDAL streaming company owed him more than $3 million.
Per TMZ, the “Heartless” emcee reportedly attempted to end his agreement with the music service only to have the company threaten to sue him for breach of contract.
The outlet reported that West was promised a bonus for bringing more than 1.5 million new subscribers to TIDAL following the release of his album “The Life of Pablo.”
He also claimed the company reneged on reimbursing him for music videos.
Due to the drama, he parted ways with TIDAL.
Jay-Z says he has ‘genuine love’ for Kanye West
During a November 2017 interview with the New York Times, Jay revealed that he and West were back on speaking terms.
“[I talked to] Kanye the other day, just to tell him, like, he’s my brother. I love Kanye. I do. It’s a complicated relationship with us … ‘Cause, you know — Kanye came into this business on my label. So I’ve always been like his big brother,” he said.
“And we’re both entertainers. It’s always been like a little underlying competition with your big brother … So it’s like, we both — everyone wants to be the greatest in the world. You know what I’m saying? And then there’s like a lot of other factors that play in it. But it’s gonna, we gonna always be good.”
The dad of three continued: “It’s just that there’s certain things that happened that’s not really acceptable to me. And we just need to speak about it. But there’s genuine love there.”
Jay-Z reveals why he and Beyoncé skipped KimYe wedding
On Jay and Bey’s 2018 joint album, “Everything Is Love,” the hip-hop mogul addressed why he and his wife skipped Ye and Kardashian’s 2014 wedding.
On the track “Friends,” he rapped: “I ain’t goin’ to nobody nothin’ when me and my wife beefin’ / I don’t care if the house on fire, I’m dyin’, n–a, I ain’t leavin’.”
Jay and the “Cowboy Carter” songstress were going through marital issues at the time of the nuptials and decided to work on their strained relationship instead of traveling to Italy.
In an interview with Charlamagne tha God, West admitted he was “hurt” by the couple missing his wedding.
“I understand they was going through some things. But if it’s family, you’re not gonna miss a wedding,” he told the “Breakfast Club” radio host.
Kanye West attacks Jay-Z and Beyoncé’s children online
On March 18, 2025, West attacked Beyoncé and Jay’s youngest two children, Sir and Rumi, in a disgusting, all-caps rant via X.
The “Stronger” rapper questioned the twins’ mental capacity before deleting the unprovoked post — only to re-share it in the wee hours the following morning.
West, however, clarified that he had not wiped the hateful upload in order to be “a good person.”
Instead, West wrote, “I need everyone to know that I took the post about Jay Z and Beyoncé’s family down … because there was a possibility of my Twitter being cancelled [sic].”
The following day, West tweeted that he felt “bad” about inexplicably attacking the twins before he immediately backtracked.
“I LOVE JAY Z AND I DO FEEL BAD,” he tweeted March 19, 2025. “I ALWAYS FELT LIKE THE BLACK SHEEP LIKE I WANTED FAMILY IN THIS MUSIC S–T.”
West ended his rant by saying: “S–T HURTS SO F–K BOTH OF THEM CAUSE WHEN I NEEDED THEM IT WAS F–K ME.”
While Jay and the “Cuff It” singer have been mum over the vile remarks, her mother, Tina Knowles, seemingly clapped back at West over her grandchildren.
“It’s hard to remain positive and classy in the face of ignorance and evil. But I know that no weapon formed against me or my family shall prosper,” the House of Deréon founder posted via Instagram on March 19, 2025, alongside a video of herself telling a “corny joke.”
“This battle is not mine, but the Lords, I know that God has got this.”
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