This Nicki Minaj trivia quiz has 80 free questions with answers and follows the whole arc: the girl born in Port of Spain and raised in New York, the performing-arts high school and the restaurant job, the mixtapes that got a Young Money label boss on the phone, and the debut album that opened bigger than any female rap record this century. From there it moves through the songs everyone knows, the alter egos, the film and television detours, and the run of Billboard records that made her the best-selling female rapper of all time, right up to Pink Friday 2 and the Gag City tour. The early questions are gentle enough for casual listeners; the later ones dig into chart peaks, sample sources, tour details and business ventures that only serious fans will know. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries and other primary references before publishing, so you can trust the results and argue about them with confidence.
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Q 01What is Nicki Minaj's birth name?
Onika Tanya Maraj
She has performed under variations of the stage name since the mid-2000s and hyphenated her husband's surname onto her own after marrying in 2019.
Q 02She was born in the Saint James district of which Trinidad and Tobago city?
Port of Spain
As a small child she lived there with her grandmother in a household with 11 cousins while her mother went ahead to New York.
Q 03At roughly what age was she brought to live with her parents in New York City?
5
Her mother had moved to the Bronx to attend Monroe College before sending for her, and the family settled in the South Jamaica neighborhood.
Q 04Which New York City borough did she grow up in after arriving from the Caribbean?
Queens
A planned ABC Family sitcom about her upbringing there, titled Nicki, shot a pilot in her old neighborhood in 2016 but never aired.
Q 05She successfully auditioned for which specialist New York City public high school?
LaGuardia
The school focuses on visual and performing arts, and a week after graduating she was cast in an Off-Broadway play called In Case You Forget.
Q 06Before her music career took off, she waited tables at a Bronx branch of which restaurant chain?
Red Lobster
She also worked in customer service and office management, and has said she was fired for being discourteous to customers.
Q 07What was the New York hip hop group Nicki Minaj rapped in from 2002 to 2004 called?
Hoodstars
The group was recruited by Lou$tar, son of Full Force's Bowlegged Lou, who said she was already doing 'the crazy voices' back then.
Q 08In 2004 her early group recorded a WWE entrance theme, 'Don't Mess With', for which Diva?
Victoria
The track landed on the compilation ThemeAddict: WWE The Music, Vol. 6, an unlikely first credit for a future Queen of Rap.
Q 09Who is credited with switching Nicki's stage name to 'Minaj' after signing her in 2006?
Fendi
He reportedly changed it because of her 'nasty flow', and signed her to a 180-day contract after finding her on Myspace.
Q 10What was the title of her first mixtape, released in July 2007?
Playtime Is Over
Its 'Click Clack' video appeared on the underground DVD The Come Up Vol. 11, which is where her future label boss first noticed her.
Q 11Her rap on The Come Up DVD caught which rapper's attention, leading to an invite to his Young Money imprint?
Lil Wayne
She turned down a Warner Brothers deal that would have required a ghostwriter, and eventually signed with Young Money in 2009 while keeping her 360 rights.
Q 12Which producer and label boss asked her to sign to Murder Inc. before she chose Young Money?
Irv Gotti
She countered by offering him a job as her manager, which he declined; a conversation with him later inspired the song 'Moment 4 Life'.
Q 13Her 2009 mixtape Beam Me Up Scotty was reissued in 2021 and debuted where on the Billboard 200?
2
That made it the highest-charting re-released mixtape by any rapper and the highest debut ever for a female rap mixtape.
Q 21Where did Pink Friday place on Rolling Stone's 2022 list of the 200 Greatest Hip-Hop Albums?
31
The magazine said the album proved an artist could own the charts without dialing back her individuality; Vibe later named it one of the 50 greatest Black albums of the modern era.
Q 22Which alter ego did she describe as a 'demon', a 'lunatic' and a gay boy who lives inside her?
Roman Zolanski
The character had a whole 2012 album named for him and returned in a 2022 remix that added a third verse to 'Super Freaky Girl'.
Q 23Roman's proper British mother, heard screaming at the end of 'Roman's Revenge', is which alter ego?
Martha
In 2023 she answered a fan asking if the character would return by confirming she had died of old age.
Q 14Which 2010 Sean Garrett-featuring single was dropped as Pink Friday's lead single after underperforming?
Massive Attack
Its replacement as lead single was a leaked, unmastered demo that only got an official release after radio picked it up.
Q 15Pink Friday's lead single 'Your Love' samples a 1995 cover of 'No More I Love You's' by whom?
Annie Lennox
Producer Pop Wansel attached the beat to an email by accident; she liked it, and the resulting demo sat unreleased for two years before it leaked.
Q 16Her 2010 single 'Check It Out' with will.i.am is built around the hook of which 1979 Buggles song?
Video Killed the Radio Star
The original was famously the first video ever played on MTV; her track peaked at number 24 on the Hot 100.
Q 17Which fellow Young Money artist is featured on the Pink Friday single 'Moment 4 Life'?
Drake
The song earned a Best Rap Performance Grammy nomination and grew out of advice she got to enjoy the moment of being a new star.
Q 18Pink Friday sold how many copies in its first week in the United States?
375,000
It was the second-biggest sales week ever for a female rap album, and the record went triple platinum by 2016.
Q 19Pink Friday's opening week was second all-time for a female rap album only to which 1998 album?
The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill
Pink Friday also became the first album by a solo female rapper to go platinum in seven years.
Q 20On 'Roman's Revenge', Nicki's alter ego trades verses with which rapper performing as his own alter ego?
Eminem
The original hook borrowed from West Side Story's 'I Feel Pretty' but had to be replaced over copyright issues.
Q 24As a child she escaped her parents' fighting by living through invented characters. What was her first identity called?
Cookie
That persona gave way to Harajuku Barbie and, eventually, Nicki Minaj herself.
Q 25Her acclaimed 2010 guest verse on Kanye West's 'Monster' ran how many bars?
32
West admitted he considered cutting the verse because he worried it would outshine his own work on the album.
Q 26Which indie folk act's frontman, Justin Vernon, sings on 'Monster' with Kanye West, Jay-Z and Rick Ross?
Bon Iver
Vernon watched her record her verse and admired it, though he later admitted he had no idea who she was at the time.
Q 27Performing 'Monster' in 2010, she became the first female rapper to perform at which venue?
Yankee Stadium
Complex later ranked the verse the best rap verse of the previous five years, and the Los Angeles Times named it one of the 50 greatest moments in hip hop history.
Q 28Her first Grammy nomination, in 2010, was for a guest verse on which rapper's 'My Chick Bad'?
Ludacris
A year later she picked up three more nominations, including Best New Artist and Best Rap Album for Pink Friday.
Q 29How many Grammy nominations had Nicki Minaj received by the 2024 ceremony?
12
Her most recent pair at that point came for 'Barbie World' with Ice Spice, her first Grammy nods in seven years.
Q 30Which song did Nicki Minaj perform at the 2012 Grammys, in an exorcism-themed staging?
Roman Holiday
The performance drew a rebuke from the American Catholic League and its president.