Biography
Doja Cat Biography
Ashram Childhood and Bedroom Beginnings
Amala Ratna Zandile Dlamini was born on October 21, 1995, in the Tarzana area of Los Angeles, to painter Deborah Sawyer and South African actor-dancer Dumisani Dlamini, who was largely absent from her upbringing. Between roughly ages eight and twelve she lived with her family in an ashram founded by jazz musician Alice Coltrane in the Santa Monica Mountains, studying Bharatanatyam dance and Hindu devotional singing before the family resettled in the nearby Oak Park area on LA's western edge.
She has described her adolescence as inward and restless: bored at school and withdrawn at home, she dropped out in her junior year at sixteen and retreated to her bedroom, writing her first songs, teaching herself beats and posting experiments to SoundCloud. Her earliest uploads blended airy R&B singing with quick-tongued rapping, a duality that would define her career rather than complicate it.
SoundCloud to Purrr! and Amala
So High, a smoke-curled R&B track uploaded while she was still a teenager, traveled through blogs and landed her a deal with Dr. Luke's Kemosabe Records in partnership with RCA. The Purrr! EP (2014) established her online presence, and she spent the following years cultivating a mischievous, hyper-online persona across SoundCloud, YouTube and Twitter while writing toward a debut.
Amala arrived in March 2018 and initially sputtered, a fact Dlamini has discussed candidly, blaming a rushed process and her own unfocused state during its creation. The August 2018 release of Mooo!, a deliberately absurd cow-themed novelty video she made herself, changed the trajectory: praised by peers and memed into ubiquity, it drove streams back to her catalog and forced her label to reengage with an artist the internet had decided to champion.
Hot Pink and the Say So Breakthrough
Second album Hot Pink, released November 2019, sharpened the pop-rap synthesis. Juicy with Tyga became her first Hot 100 entry, Rules and Bottom Bitch flexed range, and Streets later powered the Silhouette Challenge TikTok wave. But Say So was the inflection point: its disco-funk glide inspired a viral dance challenge, and the Nicki Minaj remix pushed it to number one on the Hot 100 in May 2020, a first for both artists.
The era's accolades followed quickly: Hot Pink earned her first Grammy nominations, including Best New Artist and Record of the Year for Say So at the 2021 ceremony, and she became a fixture of award-show stages, late-night television and festival bills. The pandemic period also cemented her reputation for chaotic, funny, unfiltered internet presence, an asset that would later require more careful management as fame intensified.
Planet Her Dominance
Planet Her, released June 2021, was designed as blockbuster pop and executed accordingly: it debuted at number two on the Billboard 200, topped Billboard's R&B albums chart, and became one of the year's best-selling albums. Kiss Me More, featuring SZA, interpolated Olivia Newton-John's Physical into a summery smash, Woman rode Afrobeats-tinged percussion to a long chart life, and Need To Know and You Right deepened the album's reach.
The Recording Academy rewarded the cycle with eight nominations at the 2022 Grammys, including Album of the Year for the deluxe edition, and Kiss Me More won Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, her first Grammy, accepted visibly moved. Per promoter biographical materials, she also became the first rapper with three simultaneous top-ten songs at Top 40 radio during this stretch. Yet she has said the era's pop polish drew unfair skepticism about her rap credentials, a critique that shaped what came next.
Scarlet Defiance
Her response was deliberate provocation: she shaved her head and eyebrows, covered her back with a bat-skeleton tattoo, and steered her fourth album toward uncompromising hip-hop. Scarlet, released September 2023, traded gloss for grit on Attention and Agora Hills bookends alike, with lead single Paint The Town Red sampling Dionne Warwick into a three-week Hot 100 number one, the first rap song to top the chart that year, per her label and Live Nation materials.
The Scarlet Tour, her first full North American headline run, followed, as did a deluxe edition, Scarlet 2 CLAUDE, and a headline slot closing Coachella weekend one in April 2024. Public friction with parts of her fanbase during this period, including deleted messages that cost her hundreds of thousands of Instagram followers, prompted her to step back from Threads and later deactivate Instagram; she deleted X entirely after fans criticized the opening night of her 2025 tour, and she has credited therapy with recalibrating her relationship with criticism.
Vie and the Tour Ma Vie Era
Vie, French for life, arrived September 26, 2025, as a consciously romantic, retro-futurist album channeling eighties R&B, Prince-style funk and Janet Jackson precision, with lead single Jealous Type premiered via a Marc Jacobs campaign and performed at the 2025 VMAs with saxophonist Kenny G. She promoted it as musical guest on the season 51 premiere of Saturday Night Live and debuted at number five on the UK Official Albums Chart.
The supporting Tour Ma Vie World Tour, announced September 29, 2025, is her biggest yet: late-2025 dates across Australia, New Zealand and Asia, a Latin American leg beginning in São Paulo in February 2026, European arenas and Primavera Sound Barcelona in May-June, and a 31-date North American fall leg with Latto, closing December 1, 2026 at Madison Square Garden. Midway through the run, in March 2026, she disclosed on TikTok that she had received a borderline personality disorder diagnosis, telling fans that therapy had left her feeling 'so relieved.' In July 2026 she appeared in the video for Latto's Okayyy, a track from Latto's Big Mama album released that May, continuing a pattern of high-profile collaborations between her own album cycles.
Selected moments
Career highlights
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Mooo! goes viral
The self-made cow-themed comedy track pulled her early catalog into the mainstream and revived momentum for her debut album Amala.
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Say So reaches number one
The Hot Pink single, boosted by a viral dance and a Nicki Minaj remix, became her first Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper in May 2020.
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Planet Her blockbuster
Her third album debuted at number two on the Billboard 200, became one of the year's best sellers, and generated eight Grammy nominations in a single cycle.
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First Grammy win
Kiss Me More with SZA won Best Pop Duo/Group Performance at the 2022 Grammy Awards, her first win among nineteen career nominations.
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Paint The Town Red rules 2023
The Scarlet lead single spent three weeks at number one on the Hot 100, the first rap song to reach the top spot that year.
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Coachella headline close
She closed weekend one of Coachella 2024 as a headliner, capping the era that began with her first full North American headline tour.
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Vie opens a new chapter
Her fifth album, an eighties-inspired pivot announced through Jealous Type and a Marc Jacobs campaign, debuted at number five on the UK Official Albums Chart.
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Tour Ma Vie world run
Her biggest tour spans five regions and closes December 1, 2026 at Madison Square Garden, with Latto joining all 31 North American dates.
Recognition
Awards and Nominations
Per the Recording Academy's artist record, Doja Cat has one Grammy win from nineteen nominations: Kiss Me More with SZA won Best Pop Duo/Group Performance at the 2022 ceremony, with additional nominations spanning Best New Artist, Record of the Year, Album of the Year and rap and pop performance categories between 2021 and 2024.
Promoter biographical materials circulated with her 2025-2026 tour additionally cite five American Music Awards, five Billboard Music Awards and a TIME100 listing for 2023; those vendor figures exclude the 2025 Best K-Pop result because Born Again is credited to LISA featuring Doja Cat and RAYE. Her MTV standing is five primary-credited wins between 2020 and 2023 - PUSH Best New Artist in 2020, Best Collaboration and Best Art Direction in 2021, Best Choreography in 2022 and Best Art Direction in 2023 - rising to six when the 2025 featured credit is counted. Figures below are limited to Grammy and MTV outcomes verifiable against primary records cited here.
- Grammy Awards
- 1 win / 19 nominations
- MTV Video Music Awards
- 5 primary-credited wins (2020-2023); 6th via 2025 feature
| Year | Award | Category | Work |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | Grammy Awards | Best New ArtistNominee | Herself |
| 2021 | Grammy Awards | Record of the YearNominee | Say So |
| 2021 | Grammy Awards | Best Pop Solo PerformanceNominee | Say So |
| 2022 | Grammy Awards | Best Pop Duo/Group PerformanceWinner | Kiss Me More (with SZA) |
| 2022 | Grammy Awards | Record of the YearNominee | Kiss Me More (with SZA) |
| 2022 | Grammy Awards | Song of the YearNominee | Kiss Me More (with SZA) |
| 2022 | Grammy Awards | Album of the YearNominee | Planet Her (Deluxe) |
| 2022 | Grammy Awards | Best Pop Vocal AlbumNominee | Planet Her (Deluxe) |
| 2022 | Grammy Awards | Best Melodic Rap PerformanceNominee | Need To Know |
| 2023 | Grammy Awards | Record of the YearNominee | Woman |
| 2023 | Grammy Awards | Best Pop Solo PerformanceNominee | Woman |
| 2023 | Grammy Awards | Best Music VideoNominee | Woman |
| 2023 | Grammy Awards | Best Rap PerformanceNominee | Vegas |
| 2024 | Grammy Awards | Best Pop Solo PerformanceNominee | Paint The Town Red |
| 2024 | Grammy Awards | Best Melodic Rap PerformanceNominee | Attention |
| 2024 | Grammy Awards | Best Rap SongNominee | Attention |
| 2025 | MTV Video Music Awards | Best K-PopWinner | Born Again (LISA featuring Doja Cat and RAYE) |