Samara Weaving was born on February 23, 1992 and raised in Adelaide, South Australia. She grew up in Singapore, Fiji and Indonesia. Simon Weaving, her father, is an English filmmaker and lecturer at the University of Newcastle in Newcastle, New South Wales, as well as the artistic director of the Canberra International Film Festival. Helena Bezzina, her mother, is an art therapist who teaches museum studies at the University of Newcastle. Morgan Weaving, her sister, is also an actress, and her uncle, Hugo Weaving, is an actor as well. In 2005, Weaving and her family moved to Canberra and she attended Canberra Girls Grammar School. During that time, she became drama captain and appeared in various school and theatre productions.
In 2008, Weaving began her career in her home country, landing her first role on the series Out of the Blue. She came to prominence with her portrayal of Indi Walker on the soap opera Home and Away from 2009 to 2013. In 2011, she received an Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts (AACTA) nomination for Best Female Performance. Afterwards, she pursued roles in the United States appearing in small television roles such as Ash vs Evil Dead and SMILF. Also during this time she starred in the films Mayhem, The Babysitter, and had a supporting role in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri that earned her a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast Member in a Motion Picture. In 2019, she received further recognition for headlining the critically and commercially successful film, Ready or Not.
After her breakthrough performance in the film Bill and Ted: Face the Music, her next big project will be as co-lead in the upcoming action film, Snake Eyes, set for 2021.