The latest twist in the fiery rap feud between Kendrick Lamar and Drake just landed. A judge threw out Drake’s lawsuit against Universal Music Group, his own label. The lawsuit claimed UMG illegally boosted Kendrick Lamar’s hit song "Not Like Us." Judge Jeannette Vargas said "Not Like Us" was simply an "opinion not actionable." This means the song’s words are considered creative expression, not defamation, especially in a rap battle. This ruling adds another chapter to one of hip hop’s biggest rivalries.
This beef wasn’t always so tense. Long before Lamar’s big debut album, Good Kid, M.A.A.D City, in 2012, the Compton native and Drake were on good terms. Lamar even appeared on Drake’s 2011 album, Take Care. He also opened for the Canadian rapper during his 2012 Club Paradise tour. That same year, both artists contributed verses to ASAP Rocky’s “F***in’ Problems,” and Drake featured on Lamar’s track “Poetic Justice.”
However, just one year later, their professional relationship started to crack. Both artists began throwing subtle jabs in their music. Lamar’s verse on Big Sean’s “Control” was the first big sign. Since then, the drama has only grown, and neither seems ready to back down.
Here’s a full rundown of the Drake and Lamar saga:
August 14, 2013
The drama really kicked off when Lamar took aim at Drake and other popular rappers of the time. This happened in his verse on “Control” by Big Sean, which also featured Jay Electronica. Lamar rapped, “I’m usually homeboys with the same [people] I’m rhymin’ with / But this is hip hop, and [they] should know what time it is / And that goes for Jermaine Cole, Big K.R.I.T., Wale / Pusha T, Meek Millz, ASAP Rocky, Drake / Big Sean, Jay Electron’, Tyler, Mac Miller / I got love for all of you, but I’m tryna murder you [all] / Tryna make sure your core fans never heard of you [all] / They don’t wanna hear not one rap verse from you [all].”
Drake later told Billboard that the song did not bother him. He said he "went to dinner and kept it moving" after hearing it. “I didn’t really have anything to say about it,” he added. “It just sounded like an ambitious thought to me. That’s all it was. I know for a fact that Kendrick is not ‘murdering’ me, at all, in any platform. So when that day does come, I guess we can revisit the topic.”
September 24, 2013
Drake released his third album, Nothing Was the Same. It included the track “The Language,” which some fans saw as a response to Lamar’s boasting in “Control.” Drake rapped in the first verse, “I don’t know why they been lyin’, but your s is not inspirin’ / Bank account lookin’ like I’m ready for early retirement.” He added, “F any [person] that’s talkin’ just to get a reaction.”
October 15, 2013
At the BET Hip Hop Awards, Lamar seemed to take another dig at Drake during his freestyle session with TDE. He rapped, “Yeah, and nothing’s been the same since ‘Control’ and a [sensitive rapper] got his feelings hurt.”
December 17, 2013
Drake appeared on a remix of Future’s “S***” with Juicy J and hit back at Lamar. He rapped, “I hear you talkin’ ‘bout your city like you run that.” He also nodded to Lamar mentioning him in “Control.” Lines like, “And if a [person] say my name, he the hot one / But if I say the [person]’s name, then I’m the hot one / I’m confused, [darn] it, I’m just out here with the woes, now.”
Days later, Vibe magazine published a cover story with Drake. He told them “The Language” was not a direct reply to “Control.”
“I don’t want to get into responses,” he said when asked if the song was a reaction to Lamar. “‘The Language’ is just energy, what inspired it I guess was that, and other things. It’s just me talking my s***. I never once felt the need to respond to that record. What he’s trying to say, is what he’s trying to say. Of course, everybody wants to be the best. The problem was that I was dropping an album at the same time that verse was still stirring, so my album ended up becoming about that. What am I supposed to do? ‘We gonna be friends?’ I’ve never said he’s a bad guy or that I don’t like him. He’s a full-on genius in my eyes, but I’m also holding my ground as I should.”
Drake mentioned he hadn’t seen Lamar since the BET Hip Hop Awards. He thought everything would be fine between them. “I hold no resentment toward that guy,” he stated. “He’s still there for me, if I ever want to fall into that. I’m too smart for that… We haven’t seen each other [since that cypher], but I’m sure we will, and it will be calm. And if not, that’s how our story ends.”
March 15, 2015
Lamar released his third album, To Pimp a Butterfly. It included the song “King Kunta.” One verse — “I can appreciate the rap, but a ghostwriter? What the f*** happened?” — made many fans wonder if Lamar was hinting at rumors about Drake not writing his own lyrics. (Lamar never confirmed who he was talking about.)
June 26, 2015
The duo’s quiet conflict continued when Drake featured on The Game’s “100.” There, Drake seemed to poke fun at Lamar’s image as a conscious rapper. “I’d have all your fans / If I didn’t go pop and stick to conscious lyrics,” Drake boasted.
October 6, 2023
After "King Kunta" and "100," the beef mostly cooled down. But it flared up again in 2023 when Drake released For All the Dogs. On the track “First Person Shooter,” J. Cole rapped lines that would kick off a long back-and-forth: “I love when they argue the hardest MC / Is it K.Dot? Is it Aubrey? Or is it me? / We the big three like we started a league, but right now, I feel like Muhammad Ali.” (K.Dot is Lamar’s original stage name, and Aubrey is Drake’s real name.)
Drake, for his part, called himself “Super Bowl big.” This was a reference he would later regret.
March 22, 2024
Five months later, Lamar responded to Cole’s “big three” line in “Like That.” The song dropped on Future and Metro Boomin’s album We Don’t Trust You. Lamar rapped, “Motherf* the big three, n**, it’s just big me.”
Two days later, Drake seemingly responded to the jab from a stage in Florida. He said, “A lot of people ask me how I’m feeling… I’ve got my head up high, my back straight, I’m feeling solid in Florida and anywhere else I go. And I know that no matter what, there’s not a single [person] that can mess with me in this life.”
April 5, 2024
Cole released a diss track aimed at Lamar called “7 Minute Drill.” It was on his mixtape Might Delete Later. It had pointed lines like, “Your first s was classic, your last s was tragic.” However, two days later, Cole publicly apologized. He said he "felt terrible" about the song and removed it from streaming platforms.
April 12, 2024
Future and Metro Boomin released their joint album, We Still Don’t Trust You. It featured ASAP Rocky and The Weeknd. Fans believed both artists aimed subtle insults at Drake in their songs. On “Show of Hands,” ASAP seemed to joke that For All the Dogs had no cultural impact. The Weeknd hinted he was glad he didn’t sign with Drake’s OVO Sound label.
April 13, 2024
The real diss track war began with the leak of Drake’s “Push Ups.” In it, Drake made fun of Lamar’s height and called him a “midget.”
April 19, 2024
Days later, Drake dropped “Taylor Made Freestyle.” He dedicated it to Lamar’s past link with Taylor Swift, who he collaborated with on the “Bad Blood” remix in 2015. However, the song grabbed headlines for another reason: it featured an AI-generated sample of Tupac Shakur’s voice. Shakur’s estate sent Drake a cease and desist letter, and he removed the song from digital platforms.
April 30, 2024
Lamar hit back hard with “Euphoria.” This was the first of several diss tracks, named after the HBO drama produced by Drake. It was a six-minute song where Lamar dropped verses like: “I hate the way you walk, the way you talk, I hate the way you dress / I’m surprised you wanted that feature / You know we got some history / Even hate when you say ‘[person],’ but I guess that’s just me / It’s things that’s just embarrassing, even worth going too deep, I guess.”
May 3, 2024
Days later, the exchange continued. Lamar released “6:16 in LA,” and Drake countered with “Family Matters.” Lamar’s song suggested a "rat" inside OVO was leaking information about Drake. Drake’s track accused Lamar of cheating on his wife, Whitney Alford.
May 4, 2024
Lamar dropped two more tracks that many experts saw as ending the battle: “Meet the Grahams” and “Not Like Us.” In the first, Lamar accused Drake of having a secret daughter he’d never acknowledged. In the second, he openly accused Drake of pedophilia.
May 5, 2024
Drake denied the claims in “Meet the Grahams” and “Not Like Us” with “The Heart Part 6.” The title itself was a nod to Lamar’s own “The Heart” series. In one verse, Drake claimed he set a trap for Lamar to receive false information about the alleged secret daughter. He rapped, “We planned for a week and then we fed you the information / An 11-year-old girl, bet you gon’ take it / We thought about making up a name or a destination / But you were so thirsty, you didn’t care to investigate.”
Meanwhile, Metro Boomin released the viral sample “BBL Drizzy.” He offered a prize to the best rapper who freestyled over the beat. (The name and chorus hint at Rick Ross’s joke that Drake had butt surgery.)
May 24, 2024
Drake featured on Sexxy Red’s “U My Everything.” The song cleverly used the “BBL Drizzy” sample.
June 19, 2024
At his Juneteenth Pop Out concert, Lamar performed “Not Like Us” five times in a row. Notable attendees included NBA stars LeBron James, Russell Westbrook, and James Harden. Actors Ayo Edebiri and LaKeith Stanfield were also there.
July 4, 2024
Lamar released the music video for “Not Like Us.” It included a scene where he punched an owl puppet. (Drake’s OVO brand logo is an owl.)
September 8, 2024
The NFL announced Lamar as the headliner for the Super Bowl LIX halftime show. This meant he, not Drake, would now officially be “Super Bowl big.”
September 11, 2024
After many musicians criticized the NFL for not choosing Lil Wayne to headline (the game will be in his hometown, New Orleans), Drake chimed in. He posted several photos of Wayne on his Instagram stories.
October 1, 2024
Drake denied rumors that he sent Lamar a cease and desist letter to stop him from performing “Not Like Us” at the halftime show. “The rumors are completely false,” Drake’s spokesperson told a news outlet at the time.
November 22, 2024
Lamar surprised fans by releasing his sixth studio album, GNX. It featured production from Taylor Swift’s collaborator and friend, Jack Antonoff. On the opening track, “Wacced Out Murals,” Lamar addressed the Super Bowl controversy. He also hinted that he and Drake would never make peace. He rapped, “I never made amends, that s*** don’t add up for me / Before I make a truce, I’m bringing them to hell with me.”
November 25, 2024
In a lawsuit, Drake claimed Lamar’s record label, Universal Music Group (which is also Drake’s label), conspired to "artificially inflate" the popularity of “Not Like Us.” The lawsuit listed several alleged methods UMG used. These included bots, paying influencers, and charging Spotify lower license fees in exchange for promoting the song to users looking for "unrelated songs and artists." It also accused UMG of paying Apple to have Siri "intentionally reroute" users to Lamar’s track.
UMG strongly denied Drake’s claims. They told Billboard, “To suggest that UMG would do anything to harm its artists is offensive and false. Our marketing and promotion campaigns follow the best ethical practices. No artificial and absurd legal argument can hide the fact that fans choose what they want to listen to.”
November 26, 2024
Drake filed another lawsuit against UMG in Texas. He accused the label of allegedly using payola to promote “Not Like Us” on iHeartRadio. He also accused UMG of defamation. He argued they could have stopped the song’s release due to lyrics that "falsely accuse him of being a sex offender."
December 20, 2024
Spotify spoke out against the lawsuits. The company denied Drake’s version that the platform artificially inflated the numbers for “Not Like Us.”
“Spotify and UMG have never made any such agreement,” the company stated. It also said they found no evidence of a supposed bot attack.
In response, Drake’s lawyers argued, “It is no surprise that Spotify would try to distance itself from UMG’s alleged efforts to inflate stream numbers for the benefit of another of its artists. If Spotify and UMG have nothing to hide, they should readily cooperate with this simple request for information.”
January 3, 2025
Drake started the new year with a freestyle about his conflict with Lamar. In “Fighting Irish” – a track producer Conductor Williams posted on YouTube and later removed – Drake referenced friends like LeBron James who attended Lamar’s Pop Out concert in June 2024. He rapped, “The crowd fell for his tricks, even my brothers got tickets / Seemed like they enjoyed every minute.” He added, “Let them know this is personal for us, and it wasn’t just business.”
The Grammy winner also alluded to his legal fight with UMG. He rapped, “Wouldn’t want to see the empire fall due to a judge’s failures.”
January 14, 2025
Drake officially withdrew his initial legal challenge against UMG. This request was about the label allegedly boosting “Not Like Us” through bots and other methods. According to Billboard, his company, Frozen Moments LLC, said it was withdrawing “without costs to any party.”
A separate lawsuit in Texas for defamation and payola against UMG is still ongoing.
January 15, 2025
One day after dropping the first legal action, Drake filed a federal lawsuit. He alleged defamation and harassment by UMG. He claimed the label "put corporate greed ahead of the safety and well-being of its artists." In the 81-page filing, the rapper’s lawyers stated that Lamar’s popularity led to many attempts to break into Drake’s Toronto home. It even included a shooting that injured a security guard.
UMG denied the charges. They told a news outlet, “Not only are the allegations false, but to believe we would want to harm any artist’s reputation — let alone Drake’s — is illogical. We have made enormous investments in his music; our employees worldwide have worked tirelessly to help him achieve historic commercial and financial success. Throughout his career, Drake has successfully used UMG to distribute his music and freely participate in rap battles. Now he seeks to weaponize the legal process to silence another artist’s creative expression and claim damages for distributing that music.”
The statement continued, “We have not and are not engaging in defamation against anyone. Likewise, we will rigorously defend this legal process to protect our people, our reputation, and any artist who, directly or indirectly, is targeted by frivolous litigation simply for writing a song.”
February 9, 2025
After weeks of rumors, Lamar did perform “Not Like Us” at the Super Bowl. He even brought Drake’s rumored ex, Serena Williams, on stage during the song. As the halftime show ended, the tennis legend danced on stage in a blue and white dress. (Lamar and Williams are both from Compton, California.)
Drake and Williams were linked romantically in the early 2010s. Neither confirmed the relationship. But Drake said in 2024 that he wrote the song “Too Good” from his 2016 album Views with her in mind. “It’s funny because when I make songs about women, I make songs for them too,” he explained in behind-the-scenes footage. “If I’m going to talk about them, I’ll at least make a song that they’ll like. So I know Serena well, and I know she’ll hear it loud and clear, but she won’t hate me for it because it’s a lighthearted song.”
February 14, 2025
Drake seemed to reference his conflict with Lamar several times on his album with PartyNextDoor, Some Sexy Songs 4 U. It came out days after the Super Bowl. For example, on “Gimme a Hug” he rapped, “F*** a rap fight, I want the party lit,” and “Dudes hate the confident guy, women love him.”
On “Brian Steel,” Drake joked that he was “vegan now” after a previous line where he asked for “all the meat on the side.”
March 17, 2025
UMG asked for Drake’s lawsuit to be dismissed. They argued in court papers that Drake sued because he “lost a rap battle he himself provoked and willingly participated in.”
The documents added, “Instead of accepting defeat as the carefree rapper he claims to be, he sued his own label in a misguided attempt to nurse his wounded pride. [Drake’s lawsuit] is totally unfounded and should be dismissed with prejudice.”
UMG also pointed out that Drake had previously signed a petition against "the tendency of prosecutors to use artists’ creative expression against them," treating rap lyrics as facts. “Drake was right then and he is wrong now,” the filing continued. “The allegations in this lawsuit are nothing more than Drake’s attempt to save face after losing to Lamar.”
June 2, 2025
Pusha T, who also had his own beef with Drake, claimed Drake’s lawsuit harmed his relationship with Def Jam, a UMG label. In a GQ interview, Pusha said Def Jam wanted him to edit Lamar’s guest verse on the new Clipse album after all the “Not Like Us” drama.
“They wanted me to ask Kendrick to censor his verse, which of course I would never do,” he said. “Then they wanted me to take the song off.”
Pusha refused to remove Lamar’s verse or the song. Def Jam then ended Clipse’s contract, keeping Pusha as a solo artist. The next Clipse album will come out on Jay-Z’s Roc Nation label, with Lamar’s verse included. Meanwhile, Pusha still has no kind words for Drake.
“He no longer deserves my respect,” he told GQ. “The lawsuit thing is more serious than any rap nonsense. I just don’t respect you. Dang, it ruins art to have to talk about serious lawsuits and litigation. For this, seriously?”
July 5, 2025
Drake thought about the aftermath of his conflict with Lamar on the track “What Did I Miss?” There, he targeted both Lamar and friends and colleagues who seemed to side with the other rapper. “I don’t care if you love me, I don’t care if you like me / You ask me ‘How did it feel?’ I can’t say I wasn’t surprised,” he began. He later added, “It’s love for my brothers and death for a traitor, come on / I might say no now, but yes later, come on.”
In the song, he also referred to the Pop Out concert where Lamar performed “Not Like Us” five times. He rapped a verse that said, “I saw that brother went to Pop Out with them, but he’d been faking being a fan with the gang since ‘Headlines.’” The target was unclear, though some fans believe he was referring to LeBron James.
July 12, 2025
Hip hop’s biggest feud reignited during Drake’s headlining performance at the Wireless Festival in London. Some fans recorded Drake acknowledging anti-Lamar chants from the audience.
When the crowd started chanting “F*** Kendrick” between songs, Drake smiled and asked for a drink to toast his noisy fans.
“Bring me a drink,” Drake said, adding, “I’ll drink to that!”
Moments earlier, Drake challenged any “artist” on stage to join him if they felt they could top his performance.
“Name another artist who can do this, and we’ll bring them up right now. We can battle here. Nobody can,” Drake said. “That’s what I came to give tonight!”
October 9, 2025
Judge Jeannette Vargas dismissed Drake’s lawsuit against UMG. She ruled that “Not Like Us” is an “opinion not actionable” and does not count as defamation.
“The fact that the track was recorded in the middle of a rap battle is key to understanding its impact on an average listener,” Vargas wrote. “Even apparent statements of fact can take on the character of opinion… in public debates, intense labor disputes, or occasions when the public expects to hear epithets, heated rhetoric, or hyperbole.”
UMG celebrated the decision. They told Variety: “From the beginning, this litigation was an affront to all artists and creative expression; it never should have gone to court. We are pleased with the court’s decision and look forward to continuing to promote and support Drake’s music.”
Drake’s legal team plans to appeal the decision. They told a news outlet, “Our intention is to appeal today’s ruling, and we are confident that the Court of Appeals will review it.”
