A hip hop feud, also known as a beef or a rivalry, is a controversy in which two or more rappers create a rivalry that is manifested by each slandering and confronting the other in a number of ways.

Background

One of the most common ways rap rivals clash is through "diss songs

Diss track

A diss track or diss song is a song primarily intended to disparage or insult another person or group. While musical parodies and attacks have always existed, the trend became increasingly common in the hip hop genre as part of the hip hop rivalry phenomenon...

," which are music tracks that contain insults within the lyrics, directed at the artist's rival. Feuds are also fueled by rivals placing targeted insults in the press, confronting one another at public events and in numerous other ways. In some cases, rivalries intermingle to sometimes violent results, as happened in the east coast/west coast rivalry

East Coast-West Coast hip hop rivalry

The East Coast–West Coast Hip Hop Rivalry was a feud in the 1990s between artists and fans of the Eastcoast and Westcoast hip-hop scenes. Seeming focal points of the feud were East Coast-based rapper The Notorious B.I.G...

 of the early and mid nineties

1990s

File:1990s decade montage.png|From left, clockwise: The Hubble Space Telescope floats in space after it was taken up in 1990; American F-16s and F-15s fly over burning oil fields and the USA Lexie in Operation Desert Storm, also known as the 1991 Gulf War; The signing of the Oslo Accords on...

.

Notable feuds in the history of hip hop include The Bridge Wars

The Bridge Wars

The Bridge Wars was a hip hop rivalry during the mid-to-late 1980s and early 1990s, that arose from a dispute over the true birthplace of hip hop music and retaliation over the rejecting of a record for airplay. The Bridge Wars originally involved The South Bronx's Boogie Down Productions, led by...

, The Roxanne Saga

Roxanne Wars

The Roxanne Wars is a well-known series of hip hop rivalries during the mid-1980s, yielding perhaps the most answer records in history. It arose from a dispute over a failed appearance at a radio promotional show...

, and LL Cool J vs Kool Moe Dee

LL Cool J vs. Kool Moe Dee feud

The feud between LL Cool J and Kool Moe Dee was a renowned long-standing hip-hop rivalry between the two well known New York City rappers.-Background:...

. There is speculation in the music press that the murders of rappers The Notorious B.I.G.

The Notorious B.I.G.

Christopher George Latore Wallace , best known as The Notorious B.I.G., was an American rapper. He was also known as Biggie Smalls , Big Poppa, and The Black Frank White .Wallace was raised in the Brooklyn borough...

 and 2Pac may have been linked to their rivalry with one another. Other notable feuds include the Jay-Z vs. Nas feud

Jay-Z vs. Nas feud

The Jay-Z–Nas feud was a hip hop rivalry during the early-2000s and one of the most high-profile feuds in the history of hip hop music. It was characterized by comments between Shawn "Jay-Z" Carter and Nasir "Nas" Jones from 2001 until resolved in 2005...

.