I'm Your Baby Tonight is the third studio album by American singer Whitney Houston. It was released on November 6, 1990, by Arista Records. The album has been certified quadruple platinum in the US by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

By 1989, Whitney Houston had become one of the most successful musicians in the industry, with her last two albums - Whitney Houston (1985) and Whitney (1987) - having sold a combined 30 million copies at the time. Houston's crossover blend of pop and R&B had helped her to break barriers on pop radio and on MTV, which along with the commercial breakthrough of Michael Jackson, led to the music industry enjoying "the best time for crossover artists since the height of disco in the mid-to-late '70s", according to journalist Frank Rizzo in 1987. Despite this, however, some black critics began to voice their disapproval of Houston's music, especially with her sophomore release, Whitney, which included the number-one hits, the dance pop hit "I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)" and, in particular, the rock song, "So Emotional", accusing the singer of "selling out". They also felt that her records lacked the soul of her live performances of the same songs. Houston's name was jeered by some in the audience at both the 1988 and 1989 Soul Train Music Awards (where she first met future husband Bobby Brown) after she was announced as a nominee in a category. Houston defended herself against the criticism telling Essence magazine in 1990, "If you're gonna have a long career, there's a certain way to do it and I did it that way. I'm not ashamed of it."

Still, both Houston and her label head Clive Davis agreed to go into a more urban direction as popular music was starting to embrace a new urban pop sound called new jack swing. Even as her sophomore album Whitney was blanketing airwaves in the spring of 1988, music industry insiders were speculating that "[t]here is talk her next album will have a 'black direction'." As the material on her previous albums had been picked by the label, Houston wanted more creative control over the album's content. As a result, Houston would serve as an executive producer for the first time on an album. She recruited the new jack swing production team of L.A. Reid and Babyface, citing their work on Bobby Brown's Don't Be Cruel, to help her with her new direction. The duo would present the songs "I'm Your Baby Tonight", "My Name Is Not Susan", their sole ballad "Miracle" and "Anymore". Houston also recruited longtime idol Stevie Wonder on the album with the two collaborating on the Wonder-composed duet, "We Didn't Know", while longtime friend, singer Luther Vandross, penned the dance-pop song "Who Do You Love".

Houston would also produce a song herself, "I'm Knockin'", which was written for her by longtime musical collaborator and the musical director of her concert tours, Rickey Minor and BeBe Winans. Houston would co-produce and co-write another song with Winans titled "Takin' a Chance". Houston and Davis kept previous producers Michael Masser and Narada Michael Walden. With Masser, Houston was received the soft rock song, "After We Make Love", which would end up being their last collaboration together, while with Walden, Houston recorded the songs "I Belong to You", "Lover for Life", and the Linda Clifford ballad "All the Man That I Need", the sole cover of the album.