Ella Mai was born on November 3, 1994 in London, England. Originally raised in southwest London, she moved to New York at the age of 12 before returning to her native country after graduating from high school.

Her music career began when she competed in season 11 of "The X Factor" as part of a trio Arize. At the time, she was still studying at the British and Irish Modern Music Institute in London. Unfortunately for her, the group didn't advance beyond the initial audition for the judges. Her group broke up shortly after.

In 2015, a year after her group parted ways, Ella posted on SoundCloud a four-track EP of original songs. However, it was when she posted on Instagram several short clips of her covers that DJ Mustard discovered her talent. She then signed to the record producer's company 10 Summer Records in the following year.

One month after signing to the record label, Mai released her official debut EP "Time", which featured a collaboration with Ty Dolla $ign on track "She Don't". Her sophomore EP, "Change", hit the stores in November of the same year before she followed it up with her third EP "Ready". The latter effort was released in February 2017.

Mai's popularity began to rise when she premiered a music video for "Boo'd Up" off "Ready" in April 2018. Written by Mai, Joelle James and DJ Mustard, the song peaked at No. 5 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart. A slew of remixes of the song were released after that, including one with Nicki Minaj and Quavo of Migos.

Following the success of the song, Mai unearthed a new song titled "Trip" on August 3. The song will be featured on her self-titled album, which is set to hit the shelves on October 12.