Nagarjuna was born on 29 August 1959 in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India to actor Nageswara Rao Akkineni and Annapurna Akkineni.

Nagarjuna started off as a child actor, in the 1967 Telugu film Sudigundalu directed by veteran Adurthi Subbarao.

Nagarjuna was then starred in his debut film Vikram, which was released on 24 May 1986. In 1988, he was starred in Aakhari Poratam directed by K. Raghavendra Rao. In 1989, he was starred in Geethanjali, a love tale directed by Maniratnam.

In 1989, Nagarjuna acted in Shiva, an action blockbuster film directed by Ram Gopal Varma and has been described as a trendsetter. The film earned him Filmfare Best Actor Award.

Nagarjuna subsequently made his Bollywood debut with the Hindi remake of the same film Shiva.He followed it up with action films like Killer, Chaithanya and Nirnayamdirected by Priyadarshan.

Nagarjuna has acted in various Hindi films such as Shiva (1989 film), Drohi (1992 film), Khuda Gawah (1992), Criminal (1994), Mr. Bechara (1996), Zakhm (1998), Angaarey (1998), Agni Varsha (2002) and LOC Kargil (2003).

Nagarjuna made his début as a television producer in 2007 with the serial Yuva.He is one of the shareholders of the television channel Maa TV.

Nagarjuna got two national awards ,5 Nandi Awards and 3 Filmfare Awards South.

agarjuna, with his wife Amala,is the co-founder of Blue Cross of Hyderabad,a non-government organization(NGO) in Hyderabad,India,which works towards the welfare of animals and preservation of animal rights.