Kian Robert Lawley was born on September 2, 1995, in Sioux City, Iowa. He has Polish, Irish and German heritage. At a young age, his family moved to San Clemente, California.

Lawley launched his first channel in 2010, under the name Superkian13. Lawley also had a collaborative channel with Sam Pottorff in 2011, named KianSam13. In 2012, Lawley started a collaborative channel Our2ndLife (commonly known as O2L) along with Jc Caylen, Ricky Dillon, Trevi Moran, Connor Franta, and Sam Pottorff. The channel grew to over 2.8 million subscribers and in 2014 the group headlined a 19-city tour but they later separated in December 2014. Lawley and Caylen launched their collaborative channel KianAndJc in January 2015. At the 2015 Teen Choice Awards, Lawley won the award for Choice YouTuber.

Lawley’s first starring role was in the 2015 film The Chosen in which he played a 19 year old who must contend with a demon to save his niece. In 2016, he co-starred with Bella Thorne in the comedy Shovel Buddies. In March 2016, the film was selected and premiered at SXSW Festival. In an interview about the film Lawley said “I don’t plan to ditch to YouTube, I plan to do both [acting and YouTube]”. Lawley also played “Bean Boy” in the 2016 Tyler Perry comedy Boo! A Madea Halloween.

In 2017, Lawley and JC Caylen starred in and executive produced their show H8TERS, a comedy about internet celebrities, haters and millennial culture. That year, Lawley appeared alongside Zoey Deutch, Halston Sage, and Logan Miller in the film Before I Fall, for which he won the award for Choice Movie Actor: Drama at the 2017 Teen Choice Awards. In 2017 he also starred in the series “Zac and Mia”, a show that follows the lives of two ordinary teenagers undergoing cancer treatment. The show was nominated for six Daytime Emmy Awards and won two: Outstanding Lead Actress in a Digital Daytime Drama Series and Outstanding Writing in a Digital Drama Series. In 2017, AwesomenessTV renewed “Zac and Mia” for a second season. In 2018, Lawley received a nomination for the Best Actor In A Digital Drama Daytime Emmy Award for his performance in “Zac and Mia”.

On February 5, 2018, it was announced that Lawley had been fired from The Hate U Give due to a resurfaced video showing Lawley using racially offensive slurs. His scenes as Chris, the main character’s boyfriend, were reshot with Riverdale star KJ Apa. Lawley released an apology on Twitter, stating, “I am deeply sorry to those that were effected [sic] by my choice of language. I respect Fox’s decision to recast this role for The Hate U Give as it is an important story, and it would not be appropriate for me to be involved considering the actions of my past. I understand the impact and I have grown a lot and learned since then.” He was subsequently dropped by his talent agency CAA.