Griffith was raised in Bedford, New York, the daughter of actor/producer Peter Griffith and model/actress Nanita Greene. Her younger brother is Clay Griffith, who became a production designer and set decorator. She is the half-sister of Actress Melanie Griffith, daughter of their father's first wife. In the early 1970s, she moved with her family to Saint John, U.S. Virgin Islands. Her parents separated in 1976. Griffith attended a boarding school in Maryland, graduating in 1979, and went on to spend two years at the University of Tennessee where she became interested in acting and dropped out in 1987.

Tracy Griffith played supporting roles in some films in which her half-sister Melanie starred, such as Fear City (1985) and Crazy in Alabama (1999).

After college, Griffith worked in Hollywood and New York for the next 12 years. Her acting credits include The Guiding Light, The Good Mother (1988); Fast Food (1989); The First Power (1990); The Finest Hour (1991); All Tied Up (1993); 21 Jump Street; Lifetime's Their Second Chance, and the miniseries Ruby Ridge: An American Tragedy. She was also a regular on the ABC drama series The Monroes (1995).

In 2006, Griffith released a CD titled Red, on the Miura label, that features Western dance tunes. The title Red is her nickname, in honor of her maternal grandfather, James "Red" Greene.

A landscape Painter of the Napa Valley area, she had her first gallery show in San Francisco in 2011.

Griffith was the first female graduate of the California Su Shi Academy and one of the world’s first certified female Su Shi chefs. She worked as the featured Su Shi chef at Tsunami’s in Beverly Hills. She also was a partner and chef at Rika’s on Sunset, a Su Shi restaurant on the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles. Griffith developed a style of Su Shi without raw fish. This led to a publishing deal for her cookbook Sushi American Style, which was published by Clarkson Potter in August 2004.