Byju was born in 5th January 1980 in the Azhikode^[1][2] village of Kerala, India to Raveendran and Shobhanavalli, physics and mathematics teachers, respectively.^[3][4] He studied at a Malayalam medium school where his mother was a mathematics teacher and his father a physics teacher.^[5][6] He would skip classes and then learn at home.^[7][8]

After completing his B.Tech from the Government College of Engineering, Kannur, he joined a multinational shipping company as a service engineer.^[3] During a vacation in 2003, he helped his friends who were studying for the CAT exam.^[6] He then took the CAT exam and scored in the 100th percentile.^[6] When he took the exam again, he again scored in the 100th percentile.^[9] Two years later, he continued helping people study for the CAT exam and, based on the good results, decided to quit his job.^[6]

In 2007, Byju founded the test preparation business Byju's Classes,^[6] and the company grew to stadium-size classes.^[10] In 2011, he founded Byju's with his wife, Divya Gokulnath,^[5] whom he met while she was a student in his exam preparation class.^[11][12]

In 2015, as smartphone screen sizes increased, Byju's launched an app developed by Byju for students to learn on handheld devices.^{[13][6][14][15]} In October 2018, the app expanded to the United Kingdom, the United States and other English-speaking countries.^[16] By July 2022, the app had been downloaded more than 150 million times, and on average, its users spent 71 minutes on the app every day.^[17]

In 2021, Byju was heading advanced talks to acquire Vedantu for around $600-$700 million, but the deal didn't get through due to pending regulatory approvals.^[18]

According to Forbes, as of 2020, Byju, his wife Divya Gokulnath, and his brother Riju Raveendran have a combined net worth of $3.4 billion.^[19] In January 2021, he was added to the National Startup Advisory Council as a non-official member.^[20] In April 2021, Byju's purchased the Indian test-prep provider Aakash Educational Services Ltd. for nearly US$1 billion.^[21][22]

In July 2022, Byju invested $400 million in BYJU'S during a venture capital financing round.^[23]

On 1 February 2024, multiple shareholders were reported to have signed a notice calling for a general meeting to address various issues at BYJU'S, including requests to change the company's board of directors and leadership.^[24] In February 2024, India's economic intelligence and law enforcement entity Enforcement Directorate issued a look out notice against Raveendran.^[25] On 23 February, shareholders voted to remove Byju as CEO, and he stated afterwards that the vote was invalid due to a lack of a quorum.^[26] A previous court ruling placed the implementation of the shareholder vote on hold until after further review on 13 March 2024.^[26][27]

Byju married Divya Gokulnath, one of his early students, in 2009. Together they have two sons.^[28]