May was a Fellow of Merton College, Oxford, and an appointed member of the council of the British Science Association.

[1][13] His father was of prosperous middle-class Northern Irish origin, and his mother was the daughter of a Scottish engineer.

[16] Early in his career, May developed an interest in animal population dynamics and the relationship between complexity and stability in natural communities.

He was Chief Scientific Adviser to HM Government and head of the Office of Science and Technology (1995–2000), and president of the Royal Society (2000–2005).

When asked if religious leaders should be doing more to persuade people to combat climate change, he stated that it was absolutely necessary.

[29] He received honorary degrees from universities including Uppsala[30](1990), Yale (1993), Sydney (1995), Princeton (1996), and the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich (2003).

[32] May died at a nursing home in Oxford of pneumonia complicated by Alzheimer's disease on 28 April 2020, aged 84.