No Way Out is the debut studio album by American hip hop recording artist, songwriter and record producer Puff Daddy. It was released on July 1, 1997, by his Bad Boy record label. The label's official crediting as "The Family", featuring guest appearances from his label-mates and other artists. The production on the album was provided by Puff Daddy (real name Sean Combs), alongside with a variety of the members from the production group, called The Hitmen. Puff Daddy was also serving as a executive producer alongside The Notorious B.I.G. and Deric "D-Dot" Angelettie (of The Hitmen). It contains the generally introspective content based on his friend and rapper The Notorious B.I.G., who died from the shooting on March 9, 1997, which affected Combs emotionally. The album's content consists largely of aggressive lyrics but also includes elements of positive emotion.

The album received generally mixed to positive reviews from music critics, who generally wrote positively about its emotional feel and its production, but were divided in their reviews towards both Puff Daddy's rapping and songwriting. The album earned Combs five nominations at the 40th Grammy Awards in 1998, winning the Grammy Award for Best Rap Album.

Speaking about the album's title, Puff Daddy said that because of The Notorious B.I.G.’s death on March 9, 1997, he had felt that there is 'no way out' of things the way we were. The album's lyrical content is filled with some of his emotions that he felt while mourning the loss of his close friend. In the song, titled “Is This the End?”, he raps about experiencing the drive-by shooting that happened in Los Angeles, California, which took The Notorious B.I.G.'s life. The album was originally called Puff Daddy & The Goodfellas, then slated to be titled Hell Up in Harlem, but following the death of The Notorious B.I.G., he decided to switch the album's title to No Way Out. As discussed in "Unbelievable: The Life, Death, and Afterlife of The Notorious B.I.G." by Cheo Hodari Coker, the weight of the East Coast/West Coast rivalry and the accompanying threats had taken its toll on Combs and those around him. It was decided that they needed to get away and become focused on making hits. So, Combs brought producers Steven "Stevie J." Jordan, Deric "D-Dot" Angelettie, Nashiem Myrick and Ron "AMEN-RA" Lawrence as well as engineers Axel Niehaus and Tony Maserati down to the Caribbean Sound Basin studio in Maraval, Trindad, along with everything that they needed to craft hits. In the book, Puffy is quoted as saying, "For the next two years, I wanna have radio on lock. Call the girlfriend, wifey, or whatever, and let ‘em know that you’re not gonna be around for a few weeks. We’re gonna get away from all this drama, put our heads together, and when we come back, we’re coming back with hits." The resultant material would later be used on No Way Out, Life After Death and future Bad Boy albums from 1997 to 1999.

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