Dana Frederick White Jr., born in Manchester, Connecticut, to parents Dana White Sr. (who struggled with alcohol use disorder) and nurse June White, with a sister named Kelly, spent his early childhood in Ware, Massachusetts, before moving to Las Vegas, Nevada, in third grade. He attended Bishop Gorman High School in Las Vegas but was expelled, completed high school at Hermon High School in Levant, Maine, in 1987, and briefly attended Quincy College and the University of Massachusetts Boston before dropping out. Raised Catholic as an altar boy, he later identified as an atheist but believes in karma. White held various jobs including laying asphalt, bouncer, bellhop at the Boston Harbor Hotel, and boxercise coach, trained in boxing under Peter Welch, and managed MMA fighters Tito Ortiz and Chuck Liddell. In 2001, he convinced childhood friends Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta to buy the UFC for $2 million, becoming its president and growing it from near-bankruptcy to a multibillion-dollar enterprise, including its $4.025 billion sale to WME-IMG (led by Ari Emanuel) in 2016. Following the 2023 UFC-WWE merger into TKO Group Holdings, he serves as UFC CEO and president and on TKO's board. He founded Power Slap in 2022 and joined Meta Platforms' board in 2025, with a net worth over $600 million per Forbes in 2025. Married to Anne Louise Stella since 1996, they have three children: Dana III (born 2001), Aidan, and Savannah, and reside in a $50 million Las Vegas mansion. A close ally and vocal supporter of Donald Trump, he spoke at the 2016 and 2024 Republican National Conventions. Active on social media (@danawhite on Instagram), he has contributed to charities like 2017 Las Vegas shooting victims. Controversies include his mother's 2011 unauthorized biography accusing him of abandoning family, criticism of his brash style, fighter pay, political views, and a 2022 New Year's Eve incident where he slapped his wife (for which he apologized).