Arista Records (/ˈærɪstə/ ARR-ist-ə) is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the American division of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. The label was previously a division of Columbia Pictures and later Bertelsmann Music Group, the North American division of German conglomerate Bertelsmann. Founded in November 1974 by Clive Davis and deactivated in 2011, Arista was re-established in 2018. Along with RCA Records, Columbia Records, and Epic Records, it is one of Sony Music's four flagship record labels.

After being fired from CBS Records, Clive Davis was recruited by Alan Hirschfield, then-CEO of Columbia Pictures, in June 1974 to be a consultant for the company's record and music operations. Shortly after his hiring by CPI, Davis became president of Bell Records, replacing the departing Larry Uttal.

Davis's real goal was to reorganize and revitalize Columbia Pictures's music division. With a $10 million investment by CPI, and a reorganization of the various Columbia Pictures legacy labels (Colpix, Colgems, and Bell), Davis introduced Columbia Pictures' new record division, Arista Records, in November 1974, ultimately owning 20 percent of the company.

The label was named after Arista, New York City's public secondary school honor society (of which Davis was a member at Erasmus Hall High School).

In early 1975, most of the artists who had been signed to Bell were let go, including David Cassidy (who left for RCA Records), Tony Orlando and Dawn (who left for Elektra Records), and the 5th Dimension (which departed for ABC Records). Others, such as Suzi Quatro and Hot Chocolate, were farmed out to the Bell/Arista-distributed label, Big Tree. Several Bell acts, such as Barry Manilow, the Bay City Rollers, and Melissa Manchester continued with Arista.

The British Bell label kept that name for a couple of years before changing its name to Arista. The label was mentioned in the 1978 Nick Lowe song "They Called It Rock", in the lyric, "Arista says they love you/But the kids can't dance to this."

Arista signed the Grateful Dead in 1976, and the group released their only Top 40 pop hit, "Touch of Grey", on the label in 1987. In addition to Outlaws, Patti Smith, Eric Carmen, Air Supply, the Kinks, Lou Reed, Alan Parsons and Dionne Warwick, Arista signed Aretha Franklin in 1980, after her long relationship with Atlantic Records ended. The label's most significant acquisition came in 1983 when Davis signed Whitney Houston. Houston would become Arista's biggest-selling recording act and one of the best-selling acts in music history with sales of over 220 million records worldwide, according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

Arista had an imprint label in the 1970s called Arista Novus, which focused on contemporary jazz artists. It distributed two other jazz labels, Arista Freedom, which specialized in avant-garde jazz and, until 1982, GRP Records, which specialized in contemporary jazz and what came to be known as smooth jazz. A country music division, Career Records, was merged into the Arista Nashville division in 1997. Arista Austin was used in the late 1990s as a country label. Arista Texas (later Arista Latin) was used in the mid to late 1990s as a Tejano/Regional Mexican label. Additionally, Arista was the U.S. distributor of Jive Records from 1981 until 1987. During the 1990s, Arista also distributed Logic, Rowdy and Heavenly Recordings.^{[citation needed]}