The White Stripes use a low-fidelity, do-it-yourself approach to writing and recording. Their music features a melding of punk and blues influences and a raw simplicity of composition, arrangement, and performance. The duo is also noted for their fashion and design aesthetic which features a simple color scheme of red, white, and black. The band's discography consists of six studio albums, one live album, two extended plays (EP), one concert film, one tour documentary, twenty-six singles, and fourteen music videos. Their latest three albums have each won the Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album.

Jack White first played as a professional musician in the early 1990s, as a drummer for the Detroit cowpunk band Goober & the Peas. This led to work with various other bands, such as the garage punk band The Go (on their 1999 album Whatcha Doin'), for whom White played lead guitar, and Two-Star Tabernacle. Also, neighbor Brian Muldoon (later of The Muldoons) played drums with Jack White – still known then as Jack Gillis – and the duo informally called themselves Two Part Resin. Their post-breakup 7-inch single Makers of High Grade Suites, released in 2000 on Sympathy for the Record Industry, is credited to The Upholsterers.

Gillis married local bartender Megan Martha White on September 21, 1996. In unorthodox fashion, he took Meg White's surname. While the newly-christened Jack White continued to play in multiple bands, Meg White first began to learn to play the drums in 1997. In Jack White's words, "When she started to play drums with me, just on a lark, it felt liberating and refreshing. There was something in it that opened me up". The duo then became a band, calling themselves The White Stripes. They first performed publicly on July 14, 1997 at the Gold Dollar in Detroit.

The White Stripes began their career as part of the Michigan underground garage rock scene, playing with local bands such as Bantam Rooster, The Dirtbombs, The Paybacks, Rocket 455, and The Hentchmen. The White Stripes were signed to Italy Records, a small and independent Detroit-based garage punk label, in 1998 by Dave Buick. Buick approached them at a bar and asked if they would like to record a single for the label. Jack White initially declined, but eventually reconsidered. Their debut single "Let's Shake Hands" was released in February 1998. Its first pressing was 1,000 copies on vinyl only. This was followed in October 1998 by the "Lafayette Blues" single. Again, 1,000 copies were released on vinyl only. A third single, "The Big Three Killed My Baby" on Sympathy for the Record Industry followed in March 1999.

During the early phase of their career, Jack and Meg White provided various descriptions of their relationship. In many early interviews Jack claimed that he and Meg were siblings, a claim which was widely believed and repeated despite rumors that they were, or had been, husband and wife. In 2001, proof of their 1996 marriage emerged, yet they continued to insist publicly that they were brother and sister. The couple were divorced in March 2000 just before the band gained widespread attention. In a 2005 interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Jack White claimed that this open secret was intended to keep the focus on the music rather than the couple's relationship:

When you see a band that is two pieces, husband and wife, boyfriend and girlfriend, you think, "Oh, I see . . ." When they're brother and sister, you go, "Oh, that's interesting." You care more about the music, not the relationship – whether they're trying to save their relationship by being in a band.

The White Stripes' debut album, The White Stripes, was released on June 15, 1999 on the independent label Sympathy for the Record Industry.

The self-titled debut was produced by Jack White and engineered by Jim Diamond at his Ghetto Recorders studio in Detroit. The album was dedicated to the seminal, Detroit-area Delta blues musician, Son House—an artist who greatly influenced Jack White. The track "Cannon" from The White Stripes contains part of an a cappella version, as performed by House, of the traditional American gospel blues song "John the Revelator". The White Stripes also covered House's song "Death Letter" on their follow-up album De Stijl.

Looking back on their debut during a 2003 interview with Guitar Player, Jack White said, "I still feel we've never topped our first album. It's the most raw, the most powerful, and the most Detroit-sounding record we've made."

Allmusic said of the album: