Poniatowski was involved in Commonwealth politics, and was a prominent member of the Familia, a faction led by the Czartoryski family.

On a number of occasions he was in service of Stanisław I Leszczyński, the principal rival of Augustus II for the throne of Poland.

Having served under Leszczyński as a military officer and envoy during the Great Northern War, Poniatowski later embraced the Russian-supported Augustus.

Poniatowski, serving as a negotiator between the Wielkopolska Confederation and Charles XII, took the side of Leszczyński and distanced himself from the Sapiehas, formerly his patrons.

[1] In 1705, he became the colonel over Leszczyński's newly raised Trabant guard, modeled after the reputable Swedish Drabant Corps.

With this change in Ottoman foreign policy came the dismissal of Çorlulu Ali Pasha, Grand Vizier of Ahmed III.

His successor, Köprülü Numan Pasha, was an acquaintance of Poniatowski and had been a supporter of an anti-Russian shift in Ottoman politics.

[8] He enjoyed support from the military, but his forays into politics gained him significant opposition among the szlachta, led by the Potocki family.

[10] Over the next few years, throughout the 1740s, he and familiar supported plans for reform and strengthening the Commonwealth, however most of them have failed due to liberum veto disrupting the Sejm proceedings.

[7] He was the son of Franciszek Poniatowski [pl] (1640/1650 – 1691–1695), łowczy podlaski in 1680 and cześnik wyszogrodzki in 1690, and his wife Helena Niewiarowska, who he had married in 1673 or 1674.

[1] His older brother Józef Poniatowski (1674 – after 1731) was a generał wojsk koronnych and married Helena Otfinowska, without issue.

His younger siblings were Michał Jacenty Poniatowski, a Dominican, and Zofia Agnieszka Poniatowska [pl], a Carmelitan Abbess in Kraków.

He married firstly shortly after 1701 and divorced Teresa Woynianka-Jasieniecka, who died after 1710, without issue, and secondly Princess Konstancja Czartoryska on 14 September 1720.