Amrita Rao was born in Mumbai, on 7th June 1981. Her father, Deepak Rao owns an advertising agency. She is originally a Saraswat Hindu Brahmin. She speaks fluent Konkani, which is her mother tongue. The glamorous, fair maiden is 5'5". She has a sister Preeta, who is a well known journalist and film critic. Amrita had no ambitions of joining Bollywood. She pursued Psychology. Before joining the movie business, she was a successful model with 35 advertisements in her credentials. Her first advertisement was for the Face Cream, named Fairever. She went on to advertise for "Close-Up" the toothpaste, Cadbury and Bru Coffee. She debuted with Arya Babbar in the 2002 flick "Ab ke Baras". After this, she starred in the super successful Ken Ghosh movie "Ishq Vishk" with Shahid Kapoor and erstwhile MTV India VJ Shehnaz. Amrita was also the brand ambassador of D'Damas Gold Jewellery and Parachute brand Hair Oil. Masti(2004),SRK's Main Hoon Na , and Vivah were her successful movies, while Pyaare Mohan, Deewar and Shikhar were her average movies. She has worked in a Telegu movie as well. She has convincingly won 6 awards mainly for her work in Vivah and Ishq Vishk. She was also awarded the Dada Saheb Phalke Academy award at 25.

She has acted with Vivek Oberoi, Shahrukh Khan, Zayed Khan and Shahid Kapoor. She likes continental food and desserts like Gulab Jamun. Amrita Rao is fluent in Hindi, Marathi, English and Konkani.

Her philosophy is "Life is short and sweet, so make others happy and never let anybody down."