Rap City is a music video television program block that originally aired on the Black Entertainment Television (BET★) network from August 11, 1989, to November 8, 2008. The program was an exclusive showcase for hip hop music videos, and features interviews with and freestyles from popular rappers, and often has guest DJs serve as co-hosts. The show was created by former BET VJ/producer Alvin Jones, a.k.a. "The Unseen VJ". This was a spin-off of the "Rap Week" segment of Video Vibrations, also hosted by "The Unseen VJ". While its competitor Yo! MTV Raps, which is now discontinued, mainly focused on all of the popular rappers, Rap City also included videos from up and coming underground rappers. Among notable previous hosts of the show are Chris Thomas (the first host of the show from 1989–1991). Throughout his run, Thomas was also known as "The Mayor of Rap City", or simply "The Mayor". Other hosts included Hans Dobson aka Prime (1989–1993), Prince Dejour (1991–1994), Joe Clair (1994–1999), Leslie Segar (a.k.a. Big Lez) (1994–1999), Big Tigger (1998–2005), Mad Linx (2005–2006), J-Nicks (2005–2006) and Q-45 (2006–2008).

On September 13, 1999, the show was re-titled Rap City: Tha Basement and newly hosted by Big Tigger (a.k.a. Tigger), who succeeded Joe Clair and Big Lez. On August 28, 2000, BET moved the show to a new time slot at 4 p.m. On January 18, 2005, the show was repackaged and host Big Tigger was replaced by Mad Linx, a DJ and radio personality. The transition was explained that Tigger's "mother" sold the basement and forced Big Tigger out to live with his father. On October 3, 2005, Mad Linx went on hiatus to host BET Road Show. For several months, the show was hosted by J-Nicks, a native of St. Louis. Occasionally, special guests (such as a hip hop star) would host Rap City. The network also shortened the shows run time from two to one hour.

On December 28, 2005, BET returned the show to its original 5 p.m. time slot. Mad Linx returned to his weekday routine on February 2, 2006. J-Nicks left to work as a weekday radio DJ for WHTA Hot 107.9 FM in Atlanta. On August 14, 2006, Q45 replaced Mad Linx on the show. On September 25, 2006, the time slot for Rap City changed to 4 p.m., and then flipped back to 5 p.m. in October 2006. From that moment on, Q45 hosted the show on Weekdays. Mad Linx hosted Rap City Top 10 on Saturdays and Big Tigger hosted the show as Rap City Presents... specials.

On September 17, 2007, BET changed the time slot of Rap City to 1 a.m. Eastern time. A time slot previously held by re-runs of The Parkers and other syndicated shows. In the timeslot that Rap City previously occupied, random music videos are now being shown. In October 2007, due to drop of ratings Rap City returned to its previous time slot at 5 p.m. In September 2008, Rap City obtained a new time of 3 p.m. On October 1, 2008, BET officially canceled Rap City, its last airing was Saturday, November 8, 2008, and was replaced by now-cancelled The Deal on November 10, 2008.[3] On Friday, June 12, 2009, a Rap City: Relapse special was aired on BET hosted by Big Tigger with guest Eminem. On November 6, 2013, Rap City returned with another special called EM360 with guest Eminem to promote his album The Marshall Mathers LP 2.