Ranbir Kapoor was born on 28 September 1982 in Bombay (now Mumbai) to actors Rishi Kapoor and Neetu Kapoor. He is the grandson of actor-director Raj Kapoor and the great-grandson of Prithviraj Kapoor. His elder sister, Riddhima Kapoor Sahni, is a designer, and actresses Karisma Kapoor and Kareena Kapoor Khan are his cousins.
He studied at Bombay Scottish School, Mahim, and completed his pre-university education at H.R. College of Commerce and Economics. He then moved to New York, where he studied filmmaking at the School of Visual Arts and method acting at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute. He worked as an assistant director on his father's Aa Ab Laut Chalen (1999) and on Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Black (2005).