He is best known for his collaborations with actor and comedian Jim Carrey and director Tom Shadyac (particularly the Ace Ventura franchise), his series of "Thumbmation" shorts and his film Kung Pow!

He attended Mater Dei High School in Santa Ana, California and Golden West College in Huntington Beach.

It was during this time that Oedekerk befriended fellow comic/actor Jim Carrey while working on the television series In Living Color during its 1990–1994 run; this was the first of numerous collaborations between the two.

Prior to his successful contributions to several unknown episodes in the Color TV series, he wrote and starred in his first independent/directorial film, Smart Alex (1987).

Shortly afterward, Oedekerk again worked alongside Carrey as the project consultant for Tom Shadyac's first film Ace Ventura: Pet Detective (1994).

Following the Ace Ventura franchise, Oedekerk co-wrote The Nutty Professor (1996), which was also directed by Shadyac for Universal Pictures; it became one of the highest-grossing films of that year.

Oedekerk took a hiatus from directing major film productions for the rest of the 1990s, but continued to write screenplays, including Patch Adams (1998), Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (2000), Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius (2001), Kung Pow!

In February 2009, Universal Pictures announced that Steve Oedekerk would be penning a film adaptation of the Stretch Armstrong superhero doll.

[11] Their first animation project was the feature film Barnyard (which Oedekerk wrote, directed, produced, and performed as a voice actor).