Charlie Heaton

Heaton has a son named Archie, who was born in 2014. Archie's mother is Japanese musician Akiko Matsuura, Heaton's former bandmate in Comanechi. Heaton has spoken about how becoming a young father required him to mature quickly and take responsibility for another person.

Heaton has been in a relationship with American actress Natalia Dyer since 2016. They met while playing Jonathan Byers and Nancy Wheeler, respectively, in Stranger Things. His older sister, Levi Heaton, is an actress and has performed with Self Esteem's live backing band.

Heaton moved to London at 16 and pursued music as a drummer. He joined the noise-rock band Comanechi, which supported The Gossip, released an album in 2013, and toured for 18 months. He later played with the psychedelic rock band Half Loon.

He began considering acting while working as an extra and taking commercial jobs to supplement his income as a musician. He had no formal acting training and also worked as a bartender. His first television roles came in 2015, when he appeared in DCI Banks, Vera, and Casualty. His early film credits included Rise of the Footsoldier Part II, Urban & the Shed Crew, and the short film The Schoolboy.

Heaton's breakthrough came with Jonathan Byers in Stranger Things, which premiered on Netflix in 2016. Jonathan is the older brother of Will Byers, played by Noah Schnapp, and the son of Joyce Byers, played by Winona Ryder. The character's investigation into Will's disappearance places him at the center of the series' supernatural mystery.

Jonathan's relationship with Nancy Wheeler, played by Natalia Dyer, became an important part of the series. Heaton and Dyer's real-life relationship also drew attention because their characters' romance developed alongside their work together on the show. Heaton and the Stranger Things ensemble won the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series in 2017, and received further nominations in 2018 and 2020.

Heaton's film work has included the thriller Shut In, the coming-of-age drama As You Are, the psychological horror film Marrowbone, and the superhero film The New Mutants, in which he played Samuel Guthrie, also known as Cannonball. He later appeared as Will in No Future and as Jim Dagger in The Souvenir Part II.

Heaton played Kurt Shepard in the anthology series Soulmates and joined the television drama Industry as James Dycker. His later projects include the film Billy Knight, the film Twice Over, the series Below, and a role as Charles Shelby in a Peaky Blinders sequel series.

Although acting became Heaton's main career, music has remained part of his public work. In 2024, punk rock band Luxury Apartments released its self-titled album, featuring Heaton on drums for the song "Room Next Door".

Skinny Lister wrote the 2016 song "Charlie" about Heaton. He is also a close friend of Stranger Things co-star Joe Keery, whose Djo album The Crux includes "Charlie's Garden", a song written about their friendship and former time as neighbors while filming the series. Heaton contributed additional instrumentation and voicemails to the track.