Maid of Honour (stylized in all caps) is the tenth studio album by Canadian rapper Drake, released through OVO Sound and Republic Records on May 15, 2026 as a surprise album alongside Drake's ninth and eleventh studio albums Iceman and Habibti. The albums are a follow-up to Drake's collaborative album Some Sexy Songs 4 U (2025) and mark his first solo studio albums since For All the Dogs (2023).
Production for Maid of Honour was handled by Drake's frequent collaborators, including Gordo, O Lil Angel, and Oz, among others, and features guest appearances from Stunna Sandy, Sexyy Red, Central Cee, Popcaan, and Iconic Savvy. It was preceded by the lead single "Which One", released on July 25, 2025.
Maid of Honour is characterized by a fluid, club-oriented aesthetic, primarily drawing from dance, house and electro music; critics and journalists noted its broad soundscape as incorporating various ethnic and social cultural influences. Similar to Drake's previous releases, lyrical themes include tainted romances, financial excess, and sexual relationships, and the album also discusses drug and alcohol use.
Maid of Honour received generally positive reviews from music critics, most of whom named it the best album of the trilogy. It opened with first-week sales of 110,000 album-equivalent units in the United States and debuted at number three on the Billboard 200; with Iceman and Habibti debuting at number one and two, respectively, Drake became the first artist ever to hold the top three spots on the Billboard 200 concurrently. Internationally, Maid of Honour peaked in the top ten in several countries, including Australia, Canada, Portugal, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom.
Background and promotion Maid of Honours lead single, "Which One", was released on July 25, 2025. A snippet of the track was first previewed during Drake's "Iceman: Episode 1" livestream on July 5, and was previewed again on July 12, during the second day of his three-day Wireless Festival performance. On July 24, three weeks after releasing the single "What Did I Miss?" for Iceman, Drake premiered "Which One" in full during the "Iceman: Episode 2" livestream.
The album was surprise released on May 15, 2026, alongside Habibti, following the "Iceman: Episode 4" livestream a day prior; the CN Tower was fully illuminated ice-blue and visual projections were used to make it appear completely frozen to promote the releases. Speaking on the surprise release of all three albums, Peter A. Berry of Bloomberg News called them "a total rejection of the critical and commercial systems that often define the music business" and said Drake's "unconventional" album release strategies has resulted in him "drift[ing] further from the traditional [music] canon". The song "Stuck" on the album features additional vocals from Qendresa, who also collaborated with Drake on "Slap the City", "Fortworth", and "Gen 5" on Habibti; Drake was introduced to her music by producer Kid Masterpiece, who previously played her music on SiriusXM's OVO Sound channel.
The cover art for Maid of Honour shows a photograph of Drake's family, with his mother Sandi Sher-Graham centered holding a bridal bouquet, with a photo of a young Drake and his father Dennis Graham imposed over. The cover art was shared via Drake's Instagram on May 14, just prior to the album's release. Speaking on the style of the album's artwork, Chris Murphy of Vanity Fair remarked that it "adds an unexpected element of camp to the [album]". On September 19, Drake released the music videos for "Hoe Phase", "Road Trips", "Outside Tweaking", "Cheetah Print", "True Bestie", "New Bestie", and "Princess", which initially featured in his short film Fear of Missing Out (2026).
Speaking on the promotion of the three albums more broadly, The Faders Steffanee Wang praised Drake's execution as "simultaneously annoying, unpredictable, and genuinely exciting", writing Drake's ability to be an "incredible showman" and draw attention to his releases is rare and unique compared to the "extremely predictable and terribly dull" release and promotional techniques of other artists. Wang particularly highlighted his use of the ice sculpture and covering courtside Toronto Raptors seats with ice, concluding, "the music industry needed [Drake]–someone human, insane, and truly unhinged to break simulation".
Composition and themes Composition Maid of Honour has been compared to Drake's albums More Life (2017) and Honestly, Nevermind (2022), which notably incorporated club, dancehall, and house music. Maid of Honours primary producer, Gordo, stated that each song on the album had between 10 and 20 different versions during its recording process.
The album's opening track, "Hoe Phase", features a "moody" atmosphere that Pitchforks Alphonse Pierre compared to Drake's So Far Gone mixtape, with its latter half incorporating Afrobeats and amapiano rhythms. Jeff Ihaza of Rolling Stone praised it as "a dazzling display of how dance music, unlike traditional hip-hop, thrives on fluidity". "Outside Tweaking" is a "bouncy" footwork track with elements of Jersey club; Stunna Sandy's guest appearance was praised by Pierre as "sound[ing] like a star". Awarded Pitchfork's "Best New Track", "Cheetah Print" is a hip house and electro song that samples Peggy Gou's "(It Goes Like) Nanana". Drake raps with robotic vocal effects; his flirts throughout the track were described by Walden Green of Pitchfork as "half-hearted [...] but in a charming way". Sexyy Red appears halfway through the song for a "real freak" verse interpolating "Cha Cha Slide" into a "thottier version of the dance". "Which One" features an "island-tinged" Afrobeat and dancehall inspired instrumental. Narratively, it depicts Drake and Central Cee addressing respective love interests, with Drake noting how she stands out from her friends and enemies and Central Cee noting her physical appearance and sexuality. The Popcaan-featuring "Amazing Shape" is a "smooth" dancehall track, with Drake primarily singing in Jamaican Patois. Ihaza considered it an "upgrade" to Drake's 2016 song "Controlla", which was originally a collaboration between the two artists. "BBW" (a shortened form of the term "big beautiful woman") features elements of Mantronix-esque electro and techno, with a beat switch to "marauding" baile funk and an "explosion" of distorted synths in the second half. Pierre compared it to music at the Berlin nightclub Berghain; although, Kiana Fitzgerald of Consequence described the track as a "knockoff" of Drake's 2018 song "Nice for What" but for plus-size women.
"True Bestie" features a Jersey club instrumental with influences of footwork and drill music, a fusion that Aron A. of HotNewHipHop commended as "feel[ing] surprisingly natural rather than trend-conscious". Chicago-based rapper Iconic Savvy is credited as a featured artist on the track due to a prominent sample of her 2025 song "PSA". Following the interlude "Where's Your Stuff", performed by TikTok creator youfoundivyy, "New Bestie" is a "classic Drake breakup anthem", with his "patois-inflected" vocal delivery in the song's Jersey club-inspired second half being called a homage to dancehall artist Vybz Kartel and "a callback to [Drake's] More Life era" by The Faders Hajin Yoo. "Q&A" blends baile funk and sexy drill; Canadian producer APMelodies, who helped work on the track, said that Drake intended the instrumental to channel "summer ratchet vibes" and privately called it "a smash hit". A new jack swing song with elements of bounce music, Pierre and Jenkins compared "Stuck" to 1990s R&B acts Mint Condition and Keith Sweat, respectively, while Roisin O'Connor of The Independent considered it derived inspiration from (and served as a "blatant" musical tribute to) Michael Jackson. "Goose and the Juice" combines "gated reverb and AutoTuned pillow talk", according to Jenkins; Mikael Wood of the Los Angeles Times compared it to the work of rock band MGMT. Ludovic Hunter-Tilney of the Financial Times argued that the album's closing track, "Princess", which features emo-inspired singing and instrumentation, is Drake "trolling humourless rap purists. The last laugh [after the Lamar feud] is his". Pierre compared his performance on the song to "a 16 year old with an XXXTentacion poster on his wall", while Robert Moran of The Sydney Morning Herald noted the track's similarities to the Pixies' song "Where Is My Mind?", describing it as "oddly endearing". Ihaza hailed it as Drake's "most divisive left turn yet".
Themes Ihaza argued Maid of Honours varied sound, which includes electro, dance and house alongside dancehall, Afrobeat, hip-hop, UK rap, and grunge, explores increasing cultural literacy and rising multiculturalism in Western societies, writing: "The album's underlying argument is not that identity no longer matters, but that culture itself has become too unstable, interconnected, and diasporic to survive [any] authenticity politics". He also wrote that by Drake being "strangely honest" about rising multiculturalism on Maid of Honour, it recasts Lamar's critiques of Drake as "inauthentic" during their feud to actually demonstrate "[Drake's] prudent understanding of [culturally changing] times". This was echoed by Moran, who said that Maid of Honour "is determinedly global" and hinted its diverse content as denoting cultural pluralism, writing that "Maid of Honour might be the ultimate expression of Drake as cross-cultural agitator". Tom Breihan of Stereogum likened the use of interjections across the album to drag-ball culture, writing it "suggests a level of comfort with queerness that [an artist like] Drake has never approached before". Speaking of the albums broadly, Jenkins also commented on their multicultural influences, saying each of them "dabble in Arabic phrases" and "nod to [Drake's] Muslim associates", concluding the albums "[acknowledge] Toronto as home to countless faiths and races, to Black and Arab experiences" and ensure "appeal to all the proverbial political aisles". Murphy also noted the album's blend of multicultural experiences, highlighting "Cheetah Print"s use of "Cha Cha Slide" (which is commonly played at bar mitzvahs) being interpolated "as an instruction" on how to perform the West and Central African-derived twerking dance.
Other commentators discussed its lyrics, detailing how opener "Hoe Phase" highlights promiscuous women but also reflects Drake's own refusal to engage in monogamy, which Josiah Gogarty labelled as "surprisingly even-handed gender politics". Gogarty also noted similar lyrics themes, albeit with "much hornier" execution, on "BBW", although, some commentators singled out the lyric "So much ass [ash], you should be cremated" for criticism. Craig Jenkins of Vulture argued Drake's lyricism in the latter half of "Cheetah Print" was contradictory to the claim that "innocent Drake' [was] never coming back" from "Make Them Know" on Iceman. "Stuck" features lyrics about being caught in a relationship limbo.
Critical reception
Maid of Honour was met with generally positive reviews. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album received an average score of 68, based on eight reviews.