Following the critical success of his 1970 album The Man Who Sold the World, Mercury Records sent David Bowie on a promotional radio tour of the America in February 1971.

[5] "Queen Bitch" was debuted ahead of Hunky Dory on 3 June 1971 for BBC DJ John Peel's radio programme In Concert.

[8] Kevin Cann writes that the song was recorded by 26 July, as the finished track appeared on a promotional album compiled for Gem Productions.

[11] Although the rest of the album featured piano playing from keyboardist Rick Wakeman,[12] then-member of the Strawbs,[13] he does not appear on "Queen Bitch".

[8] Part of the genius of 'Queen Bitch' is that it filters the archness of [Marc] Bolan and [Lindsay] Kemp through the streetwise attitude of [Lou] Reed: this is a song that succeeds in making the phrase 'bipperty-bopperty hat' sound raunchy and cool.

[8][4] While author Peter Doggett considers the main riff to be similar to the Velvet Underground's "Sweet Jane",[15] O'Leary and biographer Nicholas Pegg state that it was borrowed from Eddie Cochran's "Three Steps to Heaven".

As he watches his lover from the eleventh floor of his apartment building, he describes the drag queen wearing stereotypical attire, such as "satin and tat" and a "bipperty-bopperty hat".

[21] Biographers and BBC Music's Daryl Easlea would note that the song's glam rock sound foreshadowed the direction Bowie was going to take on his next album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1972).

[25] Michael Gallucci of Ultimate Classic Rock called it one of the best songs on Hunky Dory, citing it as an example of showcasing Bowie's growth as a songwriter and proof that he would become an unpredictable artist.

[23] Furthermore, Perone describes it as a "highly effective piece of pop music theater" that stands out as one of Hunky Dory's track that has aged the best, due to its catchiness and theatricality in the band's performance.

[4][17] Jon Savage of The Guardian ranked "Queen Bitch" the second greatest glam rock song of all time in 2013, behind T. Rex's "Hot Love".

[30] In 2007, a cover version of "Queen Bitch" was made available as downloadable content for the Rock Band music video game series, as part of the "David Bowie Track Pack 01".