Joe Rogan

Joe Rogan has been married to Jessica Ditzel since 2009. They have two daughters, born in 2008 and 2010, and Rogan is the stepfather or adopted father of Ditzel's daughter from a previous relationship.

The family moved from Colorado back to Southern California in 2008 after Ditzel became pregnant. They later lived in Bell Canyon, California, before moving to Austin, Texas, in 2020. Rogan is also a second cousin of My Chemical Romance members Gerard Way and Mikey Way.

Rogan began studying martial arts as a teenager, taking up karate at 14 and taekwondo a year later. At 19, he won the U.S. Open Taekwondo Championship as a lightweight and then defeated the middleweight and heavyweight champions to win the Grand Championship. He also became the Massachusetts full-contact taekwondo champion four consecutive times and later worked as a taekwondo instructor.

He competed in amateur kickboxing and finished with a 2-1 record before retiring from competition at 21 because of frequent headaches and concerns about further injuries. Rogan began his stand-up career in Boston in 1988, moved to New York in 1990, and relocated to Los Angeles in 1994. His comedy developed into an edgy blue style influenced by performers including Richard Pryor, Sam Kinison, and Bill Hicks.

Rogan made his first major television acting appearance as Frank Valente in the 1994 Fox sitcom Hardball. From 1995 to 1999, he played electrician and handyman Joe Garrelli on the NBC sitcom NewsRadio. He later appeared in Just Shoot Me!, It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie, Venus & Vegas, Zookeeper, and Here Comes the Boom.

In 2001, Rogan became the host of NBC's reality competition series Fear Factor, which ran for six seasons through 2006 and returned for a final season in 2011 and 2012. He also co-hosted The Man Show with Doug Stanhope from 2003 to 2004 and hosted the SyFy series Joe Rogan Questions Everything in 2013.

Rogan has released comedy projects including I'm Gonna Be Dead Someday..., Shiny Happy Jihad, Live from the Tabernacle, Rocky Mountain High, Triggered, Strange Times, and Burn the Boats. His seventh hour-long special, Burn the Boats, premiered live on Netflix in 2024.

Rogan first worked for the Ultimate Fighting Championship as a backstage and post-fight interviewer, debuting at UFC 12: Judgement Day in February 1997. After the UFC was acquired by Zuffa, he became friends with UFC president Dana White, who offered him a position as a color commentator.

Rogan initially worked without pay in exchange for event tickets, then accepted payment after about 15 commentary appearances. He worked alongside Mike Goldberg until the end of 2016 and became known for combining enthusiastic fight analysis with detailed knowledge of mixed martial arts. He has won the World MMA Awards' MMA Personality of the Year honor multiple times and received the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Award for Best Television Announcer twice.

Rogan launched The Joe Rogan Experience with comedian Brian Redban in December 2009. The long-form podcast features conversations about current events, politics, philosophy, comedy, sports, science, health, and popular culture, with guests ranging from comedians and musicians to scientists, athletes, and politicians. Named guests have included Neil deGrasse Tyson, Elon Musk, Mark Calaway, Maynard James Keenan, and Bernie Sanders.

The podcast became one of the world's most popular shows and was distributed exclusively on Spotify beginning in 2021 after a 2020 licensing agreement. Spotify removed dozens of older episodes in 2022 after controversy over racial slurs and other content. The program has also faced criticism over Rogan's comments about COVID-19 vaccines, LGBTQ issues, and guests who promoted misinformation or pseudoscience.

Rogan expanded his Austin comedy activities by purchasing and renovating the city's historic Ritz theater. The venue reopened as the Comedy Mothership in March 2023, with several rooms dedicated to stand-up performances.