Bryan Johnson

Bryan Johnson (born August 22, 1977) is an American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, writer and author. He is the founder and former CEO of Kernel, a company creating devices that monitor and record brain activity, and OS Fund, a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage science and technology companies.

Johnson was also the founder, chairman and CEO of Braintree, a company specializing in mobile and web payment systems for e-commerce companies. Braintree acquired Venmo in 2012 for $26.2 million; the combined entity was acquired by PayPal for $800 million in 2013.

Johnson has received media attention for his anti-aging attempts, with a commercial company attached to the project called Blueprint. He refers to the philosophy as "don't die". In 2026 Johnson announced he was diagnosed with an incurable autoimmune disease.

Johnson was born in Provo, Utah to Richard Johnson and Ellen Huff and raised in neighboring Springville, as a middle child with a brother and a sister. After his parents divorced, Johnson lived with his mother and his stepfather, who owned a trucking company.

Johnson graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in international studies from Brigham Young University in 2003 and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business in 2007.

Johnson launched three startups between 1999 and 2003. The first one sold cell phones and helped pay his way through Brigham Young University. Johnson hired other university students to sell service plans and cell phones; Johnson earned about a $300 commission on each sale.

He also started two other businesses. Inquist, a VoIP company Johnson co-founded with three other partners, combined features of Vonage and Skype. It ended operations in 2001. After that, he joined his brother and another partner on a $70 million real estate project in 2001. The project did not meet its sales goals.

Johnson founded Braintree in 2007. The company was 47th on Inc. magazine's 2011 list of the 500 fastest-growing companies and 415th in 2012. That year, Braintree purchased Venmo, an app that allows users to send and receive money from each other electronically, for $26.2 million.

By September 2013 the company announced it was processing $12 billion in payments annually, with $4 billion on mobile. Shortly afterward, on September 26, 2013, the company was acquired by PayPal, then part of eBay, for $800 million. Time Magazine published that Johnson walked away from the sale of Braintree Venmo with more than $300 million.

In October 2014, Johnson announced the launch of the OS Fund, which invests in early-stage science and technology companies and which he backed with $100 million of his personal capital.

In 2019, Johnson stated he had for years maintained health-compromising habits, due to the demands of entrepreneurship and as a young father. He started improving his well-being through standard health interventions before shifting toward anti-aging experimentation in 2021.

In 2023, Johnson underwent a series of monthly 1-liter plasma transfusions over a six month period. One of these six transfusions was a tri-generational transfusion experiment, with Johnson's 17 year old son serving as the donor for Johnson, then Johnson was himself donor for his father. He says he will not repeat the transfusions due to lack of benefits. The FDA has stated that transfusions such as the kind Johnson had are without benefit and may be harmful. Johnson follows a strict dietary and lifestyle regimen in pursuit of life extension.

Since 2023, Johnson has publicly shared his biomarker data and engaged in competitive biohacking against other people. The idea was recommended by Kate Tolo. In 2025, Johnson recorded a DunedinPACE speed of aging score at 0.503 per calendar year. DunedinPACE is a DNA methylation biomarker used to estimate the pace of biological aging.

His attempts have been met with criticism from some experts in fields related to aging. Moshe Szyf, a professor of pharmacology and therapeutics at McGill University, has expressed skepticism that science is yet capable of achieving the remarkable results that Johnson claims to be reaching. Andrew Steele, a longevity scientist and author, emphasizes that no amount of the practices that Johnson is doing can change his genes.

In 2016, Johnson received the University of Chicago Booth's Distinguished Alumni Award.

Johnson was featured in the 2020 documentary I Am Human about brain–machine interfaces, and is the subject of the 2025 Netflix documentary Don't Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever. In 2025, he was invited to speak at the Bitcoin Conference stating that he desires to live until the year 2140, the last Bitcoin halving, when he would be 163. An excerpt from the documentary played on a loop at the Wellcome Collection's 2026 exhibition "The Coming of Age", with Johnson describing his regimen of taking pills, eating vegetables while doing lunges, and going to bed at 8:30 pm without exceptions.

Johnson was raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for whom he served a mission in Ecuador. He remained a member until he was 34.

He married and had three children. After that marriage ended he had a relationship with internet personality Taryn Southern. The two were engaged, but broke up while she had breast cancer, according to Southern. Following the breakup, Southern filed a civil lawsuit making various claims, including breach of contract and emotional distress. Because of a contract signed when she was employed by Johnson's company Kernel, the claims had to go through arbitration. The arbitrator dismissed her employment-related claims and ordered Southern to pay Johnson's legal fees. Johnson denied the allegations and addressed the case in a YouTube video released in December 2023. In December 2025, Johnson stated that he has been in a long-term relationship with Kate Tolo, a cofounder of his Blueprint venture.

Code 7: Cracking the Code for an Epic Life. Candy Wrapper. 2017. ISBN 978-1-940556-01-7.

Johnson contributed a chapter to the book Architects of Intelligence: The Truth About AI from the People Building It (2018) by the American futurist Martin Ford.

The Proto Project: A Sci-Fi Adventure of the Mind. Candy Wrapper. 2019. ISBN 978-1-940556-07-9.

Don't Die. Blueprint. 2023. ISBN 978-1-940556-16-1.

We the People. Zero. 2023. ISBN 978-1-940556-20-8.