[14] Ambani lived only briefly in Yemen because his father decided to move back to India in 1958 to start a trading business that focused on spices and textiles.

[18] The family's financial status slightly improved when they moved to India but Ambani still lived in a communal society, used public transportation, and never received an allowance.

[20] Ambani attended the Hill Grange High School at Peddar Road, Mumbai, along with his brother and Anand Jain, who later became his close associate.

[23][24] Ambani later enrolled for an MBA at Stanford University (where Steve Ballmer was his classmate[25]) but withdrew in 1980 to help his father build Reliance, which at the time was still a small but fast-growing enterprise.

[23] His father felt that real-life skills were harnessed through experiences and not by sitting in a classroom, so he called his son back to India from Stanford to take command of a yarn manufacturing project in his company.

[27] Ambani directed and led the creation of the world's largest grassroots petroleum refinery in Jamnagar, India, which could produce 660,000 barrels per day (33 million tonnes per year) in 2010, integrated with petrochemicals, power generation, port, and related infrastructure.

[36] He surpassed Jack Ma, executive chairman of Alibaba Group,[37] to become Asia's richest person with a net worth of $44.3 billion in July 2018.

[39] As of February 2018, Bloomberg's "Robin Hood Index" estimated that Ambani's personal wealth was enough to fund the operations of the Indian federal government for 20 days.

By Securities and Exchange Board of India directive, RIL carried out an organised operation with the help of its agents to obtain unauthorised profits from the trading of its formerly listed unit, RPL, which was combined with the former in 2009.

[64][65] The building requires a staff of 600 for maintenance, and it includes three helipads, a 160-car garage, private movie theatre, swimming pool, and fitness centre.

[71] In early 2019, a court in Mumbai held his younger brother, Anil Ambani, in criminal contempt for non-payment of personally guaranteed debt Reliance Communications owed to Swedish gearmaker Ericsson.

[74] On July 12 to 14, 2024, the wedding of Anant Ambani and Radhika Merchant was held as a 3-day event that took place at the Antilia building and Jio Convention Center in Mumbai.