Rosberg was born on 27 June 1985 at the Red Cross Hospital in Wiesbaden, Hesse, West Germany, the only child of the Finnish racing driver Keke Rosberg, who won the 1982 Formula One World Championship, and his German wife Gesine Gleitsmann “Sina” Dengel, an interpreter. Because his father is Finnish and his mother is German, Rosberg is a dual citizen of both countries, competing with a Finnish racing license until after his first season in the Formula 3 Euro Series. He switched to a German license to better obtain major sponsorship agreements.

At the age of four, Rosberg had his first driving experience when his father took him to a go-kart track in Ibiza for a holiday. He steered a Jeep, and his father controlled its speed with the accelerator and the brake pedals. Rosberg began competitive racing at the age of six and decided to aim for a career in Formula One motor racing after he observed his father competing in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft in 1995. His parents, who did not discourage their son’s career choice, consented on the condition that he maintained good grades at school. Rosberg’s competitive mindset, and his early achievements in go-karting helped him to better his driving ability and to convince his father to manage him.

In 1996, Rosberg won the Côte d’Azur Mini-Kart Regional Championship, and the Trophee Jérôme Bernard and the Trophee de France in 1997. Aged 12, he was the youngest champion of a French national karting series. Rosberg finished second in the French Manufacturers’ Trophy and the Côte d’Azur Regional Championship in the same year. He progressed to the European karting championships for 1998 after moving from France to Italy so he could enter international events. Competing in the 100 Junior category in a CRG kart, Rosberg finished fifth at the 28° Torneo Industrie, seventh in the Trofeo Andrea Margutti, and crashed out in the 1998 Green Helmet Trophy Cadets class of the European Championship for Cadets. In 1999, he was runner-up in the Italian Junior Karting Championship and was fourth in the ICA Junior CIK-FIA European Championship, again driving a CRG.

To win the championship, Rosberg needed to finish no worse than third, even if Hamilton won. He won the Drivers’ Championship by five points with a second-place finish after withstanding Hamilton’s attempts to back him into the chasing pack and encourage drivers to pass Rosberg to claim the title for himself. Rosberg became the second son of a former world champion to win the title since Damon Hill replicated his father Graham Hill in 1996. He published a limited-edition book entitled Finally about the 2016 season on 24 December 2016. Overall, Rosberg competed in 206 races: he won 23, achieved 30 pole positions, gained 57 podium finishes, and scored 1594.5 championship points.

Rosberg’s father asked CRG executive Dino Chiesa in late 1999 to establish a separate karting team for his son and fellow driver Lewis Hamilton for a period of two to three years. Rosberg raced for TeamMBM.com (Mercedes-Benz McLaren) for the 2000 season. He was runner-up in the European KF1 Championship and finished ninth in the Formula A World Cup. In 2001, Rosberg was tenth in the South Garda Winter Cup and sixteenth in the Formula Super A World Championship. He concluded his karting career with a third-place finish in the latter series at a race in Kerpen.

Rosberg was paid £500,000 by Williams and was the first son of a former world champion in Formula One since Damon Hill in 1999. To prepare for the season, he achieved the highest score ever in Williams’s Engineering Aptitude Test, which tests a new driver’s knowledge of car mechanics and engineering aspects of Formula One, and ceased reading the news to avoid becoming angered by negative publicity. He was assigned race engineer Tony Ross. At the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, Rosberg scored his first career points with a seventh-place finish and set the race’s fastest lap, becoming at the time the youngest fastest lap setter in history, aged 20 years, 8 months and 13 days. One week later, at the Malaysian Grand Prix, he achieved a season-best start of third before his engine failed after seven laps. He scored points once more during the season with a seventh at the European Grand Prix as he made driver errors from inexperience and drove an unreliable car. Rosberg was outpaced by his teammate Mark Webber, with whom he had a good relationship. He finished with 4 points for 17th in the Drivers’ Championship.

He grew up in a stable household. Rosberg was raised in the Wiesbaden district of Nordenstadt in the first four weeks of his life, before living between the principality of Monaco and the Spanish island of Ibiza. He was educated at the International School of Nice and the International School of Monaco. Rosberg was encouraged to pursue ventures in academia and sports. He was a conscientious, quick learner and was taught five languages: English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. Rosberg cherished studying mathematics and science, passing all of his examinations except history. He graduated with an average grade of 1.2 in 2002.

At the age of 16, Rosberg progressed to car racing, competing in three races for the 2001 Formula BMW Junior Cup Iberia finishing in 18th in the Drivers’ Championship with 38 points. For his first full season of car racing, he drove for VIVA Racing in the 2002 Formula BMW ADAC Championship, winning the drivers’ title with nine victories from twenty races and amassing 264 points. For winning the title, Rosberg drove a Williams FW24 at a test session at the Circuit de Catalunya on 3 December. At the time, he became the youngest person ever to drive a Formula One car.

The 2003 season saw Rosberg progress to the higher-tier Formula 3 Euro Series with Team Rosberg. Driving a Dallara F303-Opel car, he won once at the Bugatti Circuit and took five podium finishes for eighth in the Drivers’ Championship with 45 points. He was second in the Rookie Cup to Christian Klien. In November 2003, Rosberg was given a test in a Formula 3000 car at the Circuito de Jerez by Paolo Coloni, the team owner of Scuderia Coloni, as preparation for future Formula One testing with Williams. That same month, he entered the Macau Grand Prix and the Korea Super Prix with Carlin Motorsport, finishing 11th in Korea. Rosberg tested twice more for Williams in a modified FW25A car at the Circuit de Catalunya in December and January 2004 for them to evaluate his ability as a test driver.

In the off-season, he passed an interview for acceptation into Imperial College London, a university where several Formula One designers were educated, to study aeronautical engineering. Rosberg chose not to further his education so as to be able to commit to his racing career; the university would have allowed him to combine the course with his racing. Rosberg’s father did not overturn the decision. For the inaugural GP2 Series season in 2005, Rosberg wanted to drive for BCN Competicion due to its form in the 2004 International Formula 3000 Championship. ART Grand Prix founders Nicolas Todt and Frédéric Vasseur used a sales presentation to persuade him to race for their squad; he paid around £850,000 to drive for the team.

In April 2005, Rosberg was signed by Williams as its second test driver. He and fellow driver Nelson Piquet Jr. were analysed extensively before Rosberg was selected. He worked with Williams’s test and reserve driver Antônio Pizzonia and continued to focus on the GP2 Series. After race driver Nick Heidfeld was injured in a bicycle accident in September, Rosberg was shortlisted by Williams as his potential replacement for the final two races, the Japanese Grand Prix and the Chinese Grand Prix. The team opted for Pizzonia because they did not want to risk delaying Rosberg’s career by one to two years if he had a poor performance.

Bernie Ecclestone, Formula One’s commercial rights owner, said to Williams team principal and founder Frank Williams he thought it would be advantageous to sign Rosberg as part of a campaign to bring energetic drivers to the sport. Williams told Rosberg in October 2005 that he was assured of a role on the team as either a racer or test driver for 2006 after British American Racing’s Jenson Button was released from a contract with the team. Autosport reported Rosberg signed a contract that month to race for Williams in 2006 allowing the team to provide him with as much car acclimatisation as possible. The following month, Rosberg signed a five-year contract with Williams, being selected by Frank Williams for his driving ability, his knowledge of Formula One technology, and for articulately communicating data to engineers. He was told of the news by his father in advance.

For 2007, Rosberg was partnered by the more experienced Alexander Wurz. He and his father mutually agreed to stop working with each other, and began working with a sports psychologist. Rosberg was optimistic heading into the season, citing his experience from the year before making Williams, which had switched engine suppliers from Cosworth to Toyota, more competitive. Rosberg’s performances improved greatly from 2006 due to Williams restructuring itself and employing more experienced and capable personnel, making his FW29 car reliable and more efficient with the installation of a less complex seamless transmission. He had more confidence in setting up the car to his liking, extracting additional speed and balance consistently. Rosberg also gained experience in controlling his emotions without losing speed, frequently qualified better than Wurz and took points seven times with a season-best of fourth at the season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix. Rosberg scored 20 points for ninth in the Drivers’ Championship.

His performances throughout the season enhanced his reputation, and he was linked to several teams for 2008. After the season ended, the McLaren team shortlisted Rosberg as one of three drivers to replace the outgoing two-time world champion Fernando Alonso. They approached Frank Williams in late 2007 to discuss an offer of “majestic proportions” to purchase Rosberg’s contract, which he immediately rejected and extended Rosberg’s contract to the end of 2009 on the basis on where the team finished in the Constructors’ Championship. Rosberg later told Williams of his desire to remain with them on the condition that he would be provided with a competitive car.

The 2008 season was the first in which Rosberg was the more experienced driver on his team, being partnered by Williams test driver Kazuki Nakajima. He stated his confidence the Williams team would finish fifth or higher in the Constructors’ Championship and had improved his technical skills. Rosberg began the season with a third-place finish at the Australian Grand Prix, the first podium finish of his career. Afterwards, his campaign faltered because the FW30 car lacked outright performance and Williams did not develop the car fast enough for it to be competitive. Rosberg was occasionally outperformed by his teammate Nakajima, and driver errors lost him chances to score more points; he was able to adapt to a ban on traction control from Formula One. He improved the best result of his career with a second at the inaugural Singapore Grand Prix 14 races later, and finished 13th in the Drivers’ Championship with 17 points.

In mid-to-late 2009, Mercedes-Benz vice-president of motorsport Norbert Haug discussed with Rosberg the possibility of driving for the manufacturer in 2010 pending its acquisition of Brawn GP. Rosberg also talked to McLaren and Williams about potential employment; he was skeptical because Williams was mulling over whether Renault or Cosworth should be the team’s engine supplier. On 29 October, he confirmed his departure from Williams at the conclusion of the season and was officially released from his contract with the team on 1 January 2010. One week later Mercedes purchased 75 percent of Brawn GP and entered Formula One under its own name; Rosberg was announced as its first driver in November 2009. He was partnered with the seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher and was assigned car No. 4 after Schumacher requested No. 3 for superstitious reasons.

Rosberg was mentored by Mercedes team principal Ross Brawn although he was apprehensive given the history of Brawn and Schumacher’s relationship at Ferrari. He was told of the news by Brawn and feared Mercedes would favour Schumacher. The fears materalised when Rosberg’s strategy was discussed with just Schumacher and told the strategist of it, which made him feel better able to express his feelings and vulnerability to the team. Rosberg finished in third place at the Malaysian Grand Prix, the Chinese Grand Prix, and the British Grand Prix. He scored championship points in all but four rounds; he generally finished higher than he qualified and did so against his teammate Schumacher fifteen times to four that season. He was better able than Schumacher to cope with a terminal understeer affecting the MGP W01’s handling due to Mercedes forgoing much development work on the car because of Brawn GP’s focus on the 2009 championship. The car was five-tenths of a second slower on most circuits. Rosberg was seventh in the Drivers’ Championship with 142 points. His performances during the season enhanced his reputation as a consistent and fast driver.

The press linked Rosberg to Ferrari in place of the poor performing Felipe Massa for 2012. In November 2011, he signed a contract extension to remain at Mercedes until after 2013. An important factor in Rosberg’s decision was the Mercedes team undergoing a technical restructure, which saw the appointments of Bob Bell as technical director and Geoff Willis as head of technology in mid-2011. Other reasons included his belief Mercedes would be able to improve their performance and have a potential for race victories. For the third consecutive year, Rosberg stated his objective was to earn a race victory and improve en route to a championship win: “I am convinced that I can win with this team. Of course I respect what others hope for and think. But ultimately I’ll give full throttle and power.”

On 5 June 2011 Rosberg received the Lorenzo Bandini Trophy, which honours a recipient “for their dedication to motor racing, spirit of competition and achievements”. At the 2014 Brazilian Grand Prix, he won the inaugural FIA Pole Trophy for winning more pole positions than any other driver during the 2014 season with 11. Rosberg won the DHL Fastest Lap Award because he recorded seven fastest laps, more than any other driver during the 2016 season.

Rosberg is an ambassador for Mercedes-Benz, Laureus, the investment bank UBS, the luxury hotel brand Kempinski, the Tribute to Bambi Foundation, and the electric car manufacturer Schaeffler Group. He is part of the alcohol brewing company Heineken’s anti-drink-drive campaign. He accumulated €160,900 for the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation as part of a campaign called #DriveForGood in which €100 was donated for every kilometre he led in a Formula One race from the 2015 Chinese Grand Prix to the season-ending 2015 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. In 2012, Rosberg teamed with the children’s aid organisation Ein Herz für Kinder (German: A Heart for Children) and has raised capital for the charity through various events. Rosberg has worked for the Viva con Agua de Sankt Pauli charity, which supplies water and basic sanitation to individuals in developing countries. In response to the killing of George Floyd, in June 2020, Rosberg donated €10,000 to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund to aid its efforts in educating the public on racism and ending segregation.

Before the 2013 season, Rosberg was joined at Mercedes by the 2008 world champion Lewis Hamilton, who replaced the retired Michael Schumacher. He was granted equal status by Mercedes and received no preferential treatment alongside Hamilton. During the pre-season period, Rosberg visited the Mercedes factory in Brackley, England, displaying a fascination with the F1 W04’s technological development and assisting the team in the car’s development. He said his challenge for the season was to begin it better than the year past and acknowledged how difficult it would be: “The factory is a stronger team than it’s ever been and it’s making big steps. I have no doubts that a better car will come out of that.”

Rosberg married interior designer and long-term partner Vivian Sibold at a civil ceremony in Monaco on 11 July 2014. They have two children, Alaïa (born 2015) and Naila (born 2017), and run a creamery shop in Ibiza. He is a fan of the German football club FC Bayern Munich, played for the Monaco national tennis team, and formerly competed in triathlon events; these skills allowed him to save a five-year-old child from drowning in Monaco. Rosberg has a YouTube vlogging channel and hosts the podcast “Beyond Victory” in which he discusses human performance and development with his guests.

Rosberg continued to drive for Mercedes in 2014 with Lewis Hamilton again as his teammate. He was regarded as a favourite for the Drivers’ Championship because of the team’s development of the F1 W05 Hybrid car and adaptation to the technical regulations mandating the use of turbo-hybrid engines in pre-season testing at the Bahrain International Circuit and the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. Rosberg said that Mercedes was ready to challenge for the championship and sought the cooperation of the team members: “There’s so much that’s different this season. It’s really a matter of practising to integrate it all, and making it sub-conscious. The more you have to think, that’s when things are going to go wrong.”

For the 2014 season, the FIA created a new sporting regulation to allow a driver to select a unique car number for use throughout his Formula One career. Rosberg selected number six because it was his wife and father’s lucky number. He also changed the colour of his helmet after eight years from yellow to dark grey. The overall design included chrome, some Buddhist influence, clean lines, and personal symbols; it was designed by Jens Munser.

Rosberg won the Bambi Best Sportsman Award in 2014, the Autosport International Racing Driver Award in 2016, the 2017 Laureus World Sports Award for Breakthrough of the Year, the DMSB Cup from the German Motor Sport Federation (German: Deutscher Motor Sport Bund; DMSB) that same year, and the 2018 Special Prize Entrepreneur of the Year at the GreenTec Awards. Rosberg was inducted into the FIA Hall of Fame in December 2017.

Having signed a contract worth a reported €55 million with Mercedes that was due to expire at the conclusion of 2016, Rosberg continued to drive for the team in 2015. During the off-season he sought to correct a body deficiency, which caused him to hold his breath against g-forces in high-speed corners, since he did not want to limit the flow of oxygen to his brain and muscles. Rosberg said the experience of challenging for the Drivers’ Championship gave him more motivation to beat Hamilton in 2015 and wanted to improve his driving and win the championship. After four top-three podium finishes in the first four races, he won in Spain, Monaco and Austria, which came as his overall performance lowered from focusing more on the race than on qualifying; Vettel threatened Rosberg’s hold on second overall. Retirements in Italy and Russia and two errors on a wet track at the United States Grand Prix stopped him from taking the championship, but wins in the final three races in Mexico, Brazil and Abu Dhabi and six consecutive pole positions placed him runner-up overall with 322 points.

Before the 2016 season, Rosberg stopped reading the news and studied sleep with a jet-lag doctor as he focused on his family and winning the next event. He altered his racing gloves to improve his starts, removed paint from his helmet to make it 80 g (2.8 oz) lighter, employed a mental trainer to increase his aggression, and spent his spare time go-karting to maintain his ability. Rosberg eschewed Facebook for five months, studied philosophy, meditated to stay concentrated, and received detailed technical input from Mercedes’s mechanics at its headquarters in Brackley, England. He worked with his sports psychologist for up to eight hours per week with two hours of mental discipline every two days. Rosberg said he was confident of driving a competitive car and wanted to maintain his form by beating Hamilton more regularly.

Rosberg, who had signed a two-year contract extension with Mercedes to 2018 in mid-2016, began to contemplate retirement from motor racing when he considered the possibility of a championship win after the 2016 Japanese Grand Prix. He discussed it twice with his wife Vivian before the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix and decided to commit to retiring before the race commenced. Afterwards, Rosberg told Vivian and manager Georg Noite that he would retire before telephoning the Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff about it. He did not tell Wolff in person because he was apprehensive about Wolff’s reaction. At a FIA Prize Giving Ceremony in Vienna on 2 December 2016, five days after winning the championship, he made public his decision to retire. Rosberg said he had reached the “pinnacle” of his career; he did not want his driving skills to atrophy and wished to spend more time with his young family. He was the first reigning champion to retire from Formula One since Alain Prost in 1993. Williams driver Valtteri Bottas replaced Rosberg at Mercedes.

Creative Artists Agency (CAA), through its sports division CAA Sports, represents Rosberg’s commercial ventures. From 2010 to 2015, he was associated with the jewellery and watch brand Thomas Sabo, and the luxury travel accessory maker Tumi. Rosberg signed numerous endorsement contracts; some of the companies with which he has done business are the watchmakers Rolex, International Watch Company and Oris, the luxury fashion house Hugo Boss, the toy car company Hot Wheels, the railway company Deutsche Bahn, and the media broadcasters Sky Sports and RTL. As a result of Rosberg’s endorsement money and Mercedes salary, he was listed as one of the world’s highest-paid athletes by Forbes in 2016.

In retirement, Rosberg’s love of engineering and innovation saw him become an eco-entrepreneur. He used his celebrity to advance the industry, and began with a fact-finding visit to Silicon Valley, where he tested and observed the construction of electric and self-autonomous vehicles. In July 2017, he visited the headquarters of the all-electric Formula E racing series, and became fascinated in the e-mobility movement. Rosberg became a long-term investor and shareholder in Formula E in early 2018. Focusing primarily in Europe, Rosberg has invested in multiple start-up technology companies, and launched the Greentech Festival with the entrepreneurs Sven Krüger and Marco Voigt in February 2019 to showcase worldwide sustainable technologies at that year’s Berlin ePrix. He replaced Frank Thelen as an investor on the German television programme Die Höhle der Löwen (‘The Lions’ Cave’) in late 2019.

In October 2017, Rosberg joined Team Rosberg as an adviser for its ADAC GT Masters sports car championship team in 2018. He also joined the management team of the racing driver Robert Kubica that September. Rosberg assisted in Kubica’s desire to return to Formula One after a severe 2011 rally accident left the latter with partial movement in his right arm. He reduced his involvement with Kubica in April 2018 to focus on his business career. Since the 2018 season, Rosberg has analysed select Formula One races for Sky Sports F1 in the United Kingdom, RTL in Germany, and Sky Italia in Italy. He impressed viewers for conveying digestible information to them. That same year, Rosberg co-founded the Rosberg Young Drivers Academy with karting mentor Dino Chiesa to scout and support young go-kart drivers. In April 2019, Rosberg declined an offer from the Head of Audi Motorsport Dieter Gass to drive an RS5 DTM as a wild-card entrant in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters because he did not feel fit enough to return to racing.

In late 2020, he established Rosberg Xtreme Racing to compete in the all-electric SUV off-road racing series Extreme E from the 2021 season on. He entered the series because of its promised racing action and wanted to help combat some of climate change’s effects collectively.