Taylor Swift has apologised to Nicki Minaj after the pair became embroiled in a Twitter row after the nominations for the MTV awards were announced.

The Bad Blood singer had accused Nicki of pitting “women against each other” after the rapper complained black women were being ignored in the nominations.

Taylor leads the way with nine nominations, including video of the year for Bad Blood, which features her celebrity friends such as Kendrick Lamar, Selena Gomez, Lena Dunham, Cara Delevingne and Hailee Steinfeld.

It is also up for best art direction, best direction, best editing and best visual effects at the MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs).

Nicki, who tweeted about how race, gender and body-type may have played into nominations, “subtweeted” Taylor.

The 32-year-old singer, whose track Anaconda is nominated for best hip-hop video and best female video, had complained it had missed out on the video of the year category.

Taylor, who is the only white woman to be nominated in the video of the year category with a video which features a variety of fashion models and slim actresses, took it as a personal attack, before extending an invite to Nicki to join her on stage.

Katy Perry also weighed in on Nicki’s side, and many criticised Taylor for lashing out and misunderstanding the Anaconda star’s critique of institutional racism.

Nicki told Taylor the tweet wasn’t about her, and that she should “speak” out about the race issue within pop music.

Miley Cyrus, who won video of the year last year for Wrecking Ball, will host the 2015 VMAs, which will air live on August 30 from the Microsoft Theatre in Los Angeles.

Fans can vote for their favourite artists on www.mtv.com/ontv/vma/.