1993 saw the release of the soul, jazz and hip-hop influenced Black Tie White Noise, which reunited Bowie with Let's Dance producer Nile Rodgers. Though considered by some critics to be musically far superior to Let's Dance, the public was still unsure whether or not it was ready to be receptive to Bowie again. The album, however, met the number one spot on the UK charts with singles such as "Jump They Say" and "Miracle Goodnight". However, until re-releases later in the 1990s, the album was extraordinarily rare after the fledgling Savage Records on which it had been released suddenly went belly-up. The album is often considered Bowie's oddest departure.

Undaunted, Bowie explored new directions on albums such as 1993's The Buddha of Suburbia (built on incidental music composed for a TV series). The album still contained some of the new elements introduced in Black Tie White Noise, except with more of a twist in the direction of alternative rock. The album's odd success later led to a 1994 re-release in the United States, and Bowie hails it as being an album of entirely his own, original, and newly created work.

1995's ambitious, quasi-industrial 1. Outside, supposed to be the first volume in a subsequently abandoned nonlinear narrative of art and murder, reunited him with Eno. The album introduced the characters of one of Bowie's short stories, and was quite an interesting success. The album put Bowie back into the mainstream scene of rock music with its singles such as "Hallo Spaceboy" and "The Heart's Filthy Lesson". In September of 1995 Bowie began his the Outside Tour with Gabrels again joining Bowie as his live band's guitarist. In a move that was equally lauded and ridiculed by Bowie fans and critics, Bowie chose Trent Reznor's Nine Inch Nails as the tour partner. NIN & Bowie toured as a co-headlining act. Although initially successful, the tour was cancelled early due to poor sales. However, Reznor has gone on record numerous times as being heavily influenced by Bowie, and further collaborated with him by remixing "The Heart's Filthy Lesson".

1997's Earthling incorporated experiments in jungle and drum and bass and included a single released over the Internet, called "Telling Lies." There was ultra-sustained energy in this album, along with experiments in techno drum rhythms, while still holding to Bowie's own musical concepts. Singles such as "Little Wonder" and "I'm Afraid of Americans" (also remixed by Reznor) were the forefront of the album. There was a corresponding world tour, which was fairly successful.

On January 9th 1997 Bowie played a concert at Madison Square Garden to celebrate his 50th birthday (although his birthday is in fact on the 8th). Guest performers included Billy Corgan, Frank Black, Sonic Youth, Robert Smith of The Cure, Brian Molko and Lou Reed whose 1972 album Transformer Bowie co-produced.

The 1998 Todd Haynes film Velvet Goldmine drew its title from a Ziggy-era Bowie song and contained many events paralleling Bowie's life on and off stage; the relationship between the two main characters, Curt Wild (played by Ewan McGregor) and Brian Slade (played by Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) was loosely based on that of Bowie and Pop during the 1970s. The tagline "The rise of a star... the fall of a legend" obviously recalls the name of one of Bowie's most famous albums. In an interview with the band Placebo, Bowie noted that he liked the story, but the movie felt more like the early 1980s than the early 1970s. He combatted it in a lengthy court case, where Bowie sued to try to stop the film. The Bowie-influenced Slade character was painted as one who always seeks to steal what is about to become hip from new youth movements (à la Madonna). Also, he forbade the use of his own songs in the film.

1999's 'hours...' featured "What's Really Happening", the lyrics for which were written by the winner of an Internet competition. This album was also featured as the soundtrack of a computer game called "Omikron - The Nomad Soul." In which David Bowie and his wife, Iman, also made appearances as characters. Bowie also performed live again extensively throughout the '90s. The decade also saw him launch a branded internet service provider (BowieNet) as well as a novel and quite successful fundraising scheme to raise cash on the strength of future royalties, called Bowie Bonds.

Bowie opened the "Concert for New York City" at Madison Square Garden on 20th October 2001, to aid 9/11 victims' families. He performed two carefully chosen songs, America and "Heroes", striking a deep emotional chord in the audience of firefighters, police, other rescue workers, and bereaved families.

The 2002 album Heathen reunited him with Tony Visconti, producer of many of his best 1970s efforts, and won critical acclaim for his best chart performance in years. It also included a cover of the Pixies song 'Cactus', which was another off-shoot of Bowie's consistent interest in the band. Earlier in 1998, he had also reunited with Visconti to record a song for The Rugrats Movie called Sky Life. Surprisingly, it was edited out of the final cut, and did not feature on the film's soundtrack album. A bootleg remix of his 'Hunky Dory' classic 'The Bewlay Brothers' surfaced on white label vinyl and the internet, courtesy of the heavily Bowie influenced Steve Haw under the guise of 'DJ Spaceboy' - a name inspired by the Bowie track 'Hallo Spaceboy'.

In 2003, a report in the Sunday Express named Bowie as the second-richest entertainer in the U.K. (behind Sir Paul McCartney), with an estimated fortune of £510 million. Later that year, Bowie released a new album, Reality, and announced a world tour.

In 2004, taking the market by surprise, "A Reality Tour" was the best selling tour of the year. However, it was cut short after Bowie suffered chest discomfort while performing on stage in the northwestern German town of Scheesel, on June 25. Originally thought to be a pinched nerve in his shoulder, and later diagnosed as an acutely blocked artery, an emergency angioplasty was performed at a hospital in the region. He was then released in early July and continues to spend time recovering. The tour was cancelled for the time being, with hopes that he would go back on tour by August. Although these hopes, as time has shown, did not materialise into more live shows, Bowie released a live DVD of the tour, entitled 'David Bowie - A Reality Tour', in October 2004, which included songs spanning the full length of Bowie's career, although mostly focusing on his more recent albums. Despite hopes for a comeback, in 2005, David Bowie announced that he had made no plans for any performances during the year.

After a relatively quiet year, Bowie recorded the vocals for the song "(She Can) Do That", co-written by BT, for the movie Stealth (2005). Rumours fly about the possibility of a new album, but no announcements have been made yet. On September 9th, Bowie performed with The Arcade Fire for the nationally televised event Fashion Rocks, his first gig since the heart attack. Bowie had requested the band to perform at the show, and together they performed the Arcade Fire's song "Wake Up" from their album Funeral. He joined them again on September 15th, singing "Queen Bitch" and "Wake Up" from Central Park's Summerstage as part of the CMJ Music Marathon. Bowie has shown interest in the Montreal band since he was seen at one of their shows in New York City nearly a year ago.

A cartoon version of Bowie recently made a guest appearance in Family Guy's Stewie Griffin, The Untold Story, although he did not provide the voice for the character.

Recently David Bowie has appeared in a commercial with Snoop Dogg for XM Satellite Radio.

In 2005 Bowie appeared on Danish alt-rockers Kashmir's 2005 release, No Balance Palace, which furthermore was produced by Tony Visconti. The album also featured a spoken word performance by Lou Reed, making it the second project involving both Bowie and Reed in two years, since Reed's The Raven, which was released in 2003.

The soundtrack for the film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou featured David Bowie songs performed in Portuguese by cast member Seu Jorge (who adapted some lyrics to make them relevant to the film's story). Most of the David Bowie songs featured in the film were originally from either the 1971 album Hunky Dory or 1972's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, with the exception of Rebel Rebel which appeared on 1974's Diamond Dogs, and When I Live My Dream, which appeared on his 1967 self-titled album (this song does not appear on the soundtrack album, but is featured in the film). David Bowie commented on Jorge's performances, "Had Seu Jorge not recorded my songs acoustically in Portuguese I would never have heard this new level of beauty which he has imbued them with." [1]

Today, Bowie lives in New York City with his second wife, the Somali-born model Iman, and their daughter, Alexandria Zahra Jones (known as Lexi).