Toni Braxton, Birdman engaged

Toni Braxton and Birdman are engaged. The 50-year-old singer has confirmed that she and the 49-year-old rapper are to marry after showing off her ring in a teaser clip for her TV show Braxton Family Values, in which she tells her sisters the pair will wed.

Speaking in the preview ahead of the new season, Toni says: "I have an announcement to make ... I'm engaged."

Speculation that the couple could be engaged has been rife since November when she was spotted wearing a huge sparkler on her engagement ring finger at the Soul Train Awards.

Toni and Birdman started dating in May 2016 and first appeared in public in June that year at the BET Awards, but he played down their relationship shortly afterwards.

He said: "We're just chillin'."

The pair first met in 2002 while Toni was working on Birdman's hit Baby You Can Do It, and her mother Evelyn Braxton has previously praised her future son-in-law.

Speaking in 2016, she said: "I think he is a nice man.

"I don't care what others say about him. He is a nice man. He is full of respect. Ever since I've been knowing that man, he's been phenomenal."

The Un-Break My Heart hitmaker - who was married to Karl Lewis for 12 years from 2001 to 2013 - announced her return to music earlier this month.

She is to drop her first solo album for eight years, Sex and Cigarettes, which will feature Heart Away, a collaboration with Birdman.

In October 2016, Toni was rushed to hospital with complications related to her battle with lupus, but returned to work shortly afterwards. The pair both have two kids from previous relationships.