1988-present
Who Is Rihanna?
Rihanna is Grammy-winning pop sensation known for the hit songs “Umbrella,” “SOS,” “Diamonds,” and “Work.” The Barbados-born singer rose to fame in 2005 with release of her debut album Music of the Sun, which included the club anthem “Pon de Replay.” She has since released a total of eight studio albums, featuring an array of hit songs like “Disturbia,” “Take a Bow,” and “Love on the Brain.” A global pop star with an unrelentingly edgy image, Rihanna has won several accolades for her music, including nine Grammy Awards. She is also a businesswoman who owns multiple ventures, including the popular cosmetics line Fenty Beauty and the lingerie brand Savage X Fenty.
Quick Facts
FULL NAME: Robyn Rihanna Fenty
BORN: February 20, 1988
BIRTHPLACE: St. Michael, Barbados
PARTNER: A$AP Rocky (2020-present)
CHILDREN: RZA, Riot, and Rocki
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Pisces
Early Life
Robyn Rihanna Fenty was born on February 20, 1988, in St. Michael, Barbados. She is the eldest of three children born to Monica Fenty, an accountant, and Ronald Fenty, a warehouse supervisor. Rihanna's childhood was marred by her father's struggles with addictions to alcohol and crack cocaine and her parents' marital problems — they divorced when she was 14 years old.
Rihanna also struggled with crippling headaches for several years during her childhood, a condition she attempted to hide from her friends and classmates so that they would not think she was abnormal. “I never expressed how I felt,” she remembered. “I always kept it in. I would go to school ... you would never know there was something wrong with me.”
As a teenager, Rihanna turned to singing as a release from her troubles at home. She formed a girl group with two classmates; when they were 15 years old, they scored an audition with music producer Evan Rodgers, who was visiting the island with his Barbadian wife. Rogers was awed by the precociously beautiful and talented Rihanna, to the unfortunate detriment of her two friends. “The minute Rihanna walked into the room, it was like the other two girls didn't exist,” he admitted.
Less than a year later, when Rihanna was only 16 years old, she left Barbados to move in with Rogers and his wife in Connecticut and work on recording a demo album. “When I left Barbados, I didn't look back,” Rihanna recalled. “I wanted to do what I had to do, even if it meant moving to America.”
Music Career
In January 2005, Rogers landed Rihanna an audition for Def Jam Records and its newly minted president, the legendary rapper Jay-Z. “I was in the lobby just shaking,” she recalled. However, once Rihanna opened her voice to sing she regained her composure. “I remember staring into everybody's eyes in the room while I was singing, and at that point, I was fearless,” she said. “But the minute I stopped singing, I was like, ‘Oh my God, Jay-Z is sitting right in front of me.’” The hip-hop icon was every bit as wowed by Rihanna's commanding presence as Rogers had been two years earlier, and he signed her on the spot.
Only eight months later, in August 2005, she released her first single, “Pon de Replay,” a reggae-influenced club track that reached No. 2 on the Billboard singles chart and announced Rihanna as the next up-and-coming pop star. Her first album, Music of the Sun, released later that month, reached No. 10 on the Billboard albums chart and also featured the single “If It's Lovin' That You Want.” Rihanna released her second album, A Girl Like Me, the next year, spawning two major hits in “Unfaithful” and “SOS,” Rihanna's first No. 1 single.
In 2007, Rihanna effected a transformation from cute teen pop princess to superstar and sex symbol with her third album, Good Girl Gone Bad, fueled by its smash hit lead single “Umbrella,” featuring Jay-Z. “It shows such growth for her as an artist,” Jay-Z said about the track. “If you listen to the lyrics to that song, you know the depth and how far she's come.”
“Umbrella” topped the Billboard singles chart and earned Rihanna her first Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration. The album reached No. 2 on the charts and also featured the singles “Shut Up and Drive” and “Don't Stop the Music,” the latter featuring a sample of Michael Jackson's “Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'.” Good Girl Gone Bad: Reloaded, released the following year, scored further hits in “Disturbia,” “Take a Bow” and “Hate That I Love You.”
Continuing her onslaught of hit albums, Rihanna released Rated R in 2009 with the singles “Hard” and “Rude Boy.” Her 2010 album, Loud, was once again a commercial success behind the songs “What's My Name,” “Only Girl (In the World)” and “S&M.” Besides her own laundry list of hit songs, Rihanna collaborated on a host of popular songs by other artists from around this time, including Jay-Z's “Run this Town,” Eminem's “Love the Way You Lie,” Maroon 5's “If I Never See Your Face Again” and Kanye West's “All of the Lights.” In 2011, Rihanna released her sixth studio album: Talk That Talk. The album included "We Found Love," a track with DJ Calvin Harris that won the 2013 Grammy Award for best short-form music video.
On her Grammy-winning 2012 album Unapologetic, Rihanna turned out such hits as the No. 1 Sia Furler tune “Diamonds” and “Stay,” featuring Mikky Ekko. Interestingly, Unapologetic was the first Rihanna album to hit No. 1 on the pop charts. She also worked with Coldplay on the track “Princess of China” and, the following year, reached No. 1 again with another Eminem collaboration, “The Monster.”
Known for her sexually provocative imagery and wild style, Rihanna made headlines for the sheer dress she wore to the Council of Fashion Designers of America awards ceremony in June 2014. She was there to receive the CFDA's Fashion Icon Award and told the crowd that “Fashion has always been my defense mechanism,” according to an Associated Press report. Rihanna acknowledged that there were some rules to fashion, but explained that “rules are meant to be broken.” Around this time, the singer made a bold professional move as well: She switched from the Def Jam label to Jay-Z's Roc Nation.
In August 2015, NBC announced that Rihanna would be the key adviser on The Voice's ninth season. That same year she contributed vocals to the single “FourFiveSeconds,” a collaboration with West and famed Beatle Paul McCartney, as well as releasing “B**** Better Have My Money,” a tune allegedly inspired by court wranglings with her former manager that also featured a highly controversial, violent music video. In 2015, Rihanna also became the first artist in history to have 100 million singles digitally downloaded and streamed.
In January 2016, Rihanna released the album Anti, allowing Jay-Z's online streaming site Tidal to exclusively feature the collection of tracks for a week. The gambit paid off for the struggling service, with one million trial subscribers joining Tidal in less than a day to partake in a download promotion for Anti. The album's lead single, “Work,” featuring rapper Drake, spent nine weeks at No. 1 and earned two Grammy nominations. In 2017, Rihanna scored another hit as a featured artist on DJ Khaled's “Wild Thoughts.”
Hit Songs
Over the years, Rihanna has delivered umpteen pop hits ever since she burst onto the music scene in the mid-2000s. The pop star has an impressive 64 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, including 14 No. 1 hits and 32 tracks in the top 10. Her first No. 1 song “SOS” topped the chart for three weeks in 2006, while her Grammy-winning Jay-Z collaboration “Umbrella” far surpassed that the following year, maintaining the lead spot for seven weeks. In 2008, Rihanna had two songs top the chart: “Disturbia,” T.I.'s “Live Your Life,” and “Take a Bow.”
Two years later, she nearly doubled this feat, producing a whopping five No. 1 hits in 2010, including “Love The Way You Lie” with Eminem, “Rude Boy,” “S&M,” the Grammy-winning “Only Girl (In The World,” and “What's My Name” featuring Drake. Rihanna soon topped the Hot 100 again 2011 with her Grammy-winning Calvin Harris collaboration “We Found Love,” which spent a whopping 10 weeks at No. 1. This was soon followed by “Diamonds” in 2012 and Eminem's 2013 hit “The Monster,” which won a Grammy for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration. Her last No. 1 single, “Work” featuring Drake, lead the chart for nine weeks.
Some of her other hits include “Pon de Replay,” “Don't Stop The Music,” “Disturbia,” “Run This Town” with Jay-Z and Kanye West, “This Is What You Came For” with Calvin Harris, “Stay” featuring Mikky Ekko, “Where Have You Been,” “Needed Me,” “Hate That I Love You” featuring Ne-Yo, and “Love On The Brain.”
Albums
Rihanna's first studio album Music of the Sun was released in August 2005 to much intrigue. In its first week, it sold 69,000 copies and is now platinum certified. Since then, the singer has released seven more albums, which are all platinum or multi-platinum, making her one of the best-selling artists in the world. Rihanna has received multiple Grammy Award nominations for her albums, winning Best Urban Contemporary Album for Unapologetic in 2014. Her most recent record, Anti, came out in January 2016.
Movies
Branching out to screen work, Rihanna co-starred in the sci-fi flick Battleship (2012) and later voiced the lead character in the animated blockbuster Home (2015). In 2017, Rihanna made recurring appearances in season 5 of Bates Motel, and earned a prominent role in the science fiction flick Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. That year, fans also got their first glimpse of the pop superstar alongside Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett and Anne Hathaway in trailers for Ocean's 8, a female-led spinoff of the popular Ocean's Trilogy which hit theaters in June 2018.
The following spring, Rihanna co-starred with Donald Glover, aka Childish Gambino, in the Amazon musical Guava Island. In 2025, she voiced Smurfette in the animated movie Smurfs.
Businesses
In addition to being a talented recording artist, Rihanna is a billionaire entrepreneur with multiple successful business ventures. Most notably, she owns the popular cosmetics line Fenty Beauty, which she launched in 2017. The following year, Rihanna founded the women's lingerie brand Savage X Fenty, which is backed by the French luxury goods company LVMH. The businesses are responsible for the bulk of her wealth, catapulting her to billionaire status in 2021. She also owns the skincare brand Fenty Skin.
Philanthropy
In 2012, Rihanna launched the nonprofit Clara Lionel Foundation, named after her grandmother, which supports and funds education and early response programs around the world. For her philanthropic efforts, she was honored with the President's Award at the 2020 NAACP Image Awards.
Partner A$AP Rocky and Kids
Rihanna is in a long-term relationship with rapper A$AP Rocky. The couple began dating in November 2020 after nearly a decade of friendship. They first met in 2012 during rehearsals for the MTV Video Music Awards. In May 2022, Rihanna and A$AP Rocky had their first child together: a son named RZA. The following August, she gave birth to their son Riot. The pair welcomed their family's latest addition, a daughter named Rocki, in September 2025.
Before her romance with A$AP Rocky, Rihanna was romantically linked to billionaire Saudi businessman Hassan Jameel. They reportedly started dating in 2017 and split three years later in early 2020. Prior to that, she dated Los Angeles Dodgers player Matt Kemp from 2009 to 2010.
Rihanna was previously in an on-again-off-again romance with longtime collaborator Drake for around seven years starting in 2009, but they only confirmed their relationship a few months before they officially broke up for good in 2016.
Chris Brown
In 2009, Rihanna was the center of a media firestorm after a domestic violence incident in which her then-boyfriend Chris Brown assaulted her before an awards show. The incident sparked a huge public outpouring of support for Rihanna, and she became a spokesperson against domestic violence. "This happened to me," she said in an interview with Diane Sawyer. "It can happen to anyone."
"I put my guard up so hard," she said in a separate interview with Rolling Stone. "I didn't want people to see me cry. I didn't want people to feel bad for me. It was a very vulnerable time in my life, and I refused to let that be the image. I wanted them to see me as, 'I'm fine, I'm tough.' I put that up until it felt real."
In 2012, Rihanna appeared to be reconnecting with Brown. The pair worked together on the song "Birthday Cake" released that year. Rihanna also spoke very candidly with Oprah Winfrey about her relationship with Brown that August. She told Winfrey that Brown may have been the love of her life and she has developed "a very close friendship" with him. The two officially dated again for a time, with Rihanna maintaining in a Rolling Stone interview that Brown had changed and that any form of abuse would be unacceptable.
Net Worth
As of September 2025, Rihanna has an estimated net worth of $1 billion, according to Forbes. Most of her fortune comes from her successful cosmetics line Fenty Beauty. She also has her own women's lingerie line, Savage X Fenty.
Quotes
- When the whole worlds turning left, it's when I'm going right. I need someone to let me be just who I am inside.
- I believe in second chances, I just don't believe everyone deserves them.
- Love isn't complicated—people are.
- I'm rebellious through my music, through my fashion, tattoos and my hair.
- I have been conservative in my love life.
- Boys will be boys!!! 'Cause they can't be men!
- People think because we're young, we aren't complex but that's not true. We deal with life and love and broken hearts in the same way a woman a few years older might.
- I could never identify with that word, 'weak.' I couldn't have come out of this if I was weak. No way.
- After being tormented for so many years, being angry and dark, I'd rather just live my truth and take the backlash. I can handle it.
- I decided it was more important for me to be happy, and I wasn't going to let anyone's opinion get in the way of that. Even if it's a mistake, it's my mistake.
- You know, when I started to ... have my race be highlighted, it was mostly when I would do business deals. ... And, you know, that never ends, by the way. It’s still a thing. And it’s the thing that makes me want to prove people wrong. It almost excites me; I know what they’re expecting and I can’t wait to show them that I’m here to exceed those expectations.
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