Sabrina Carpenter grew up in East Greenville, just outside Philadelphia. She began singing at a young age and at age 10, she began posting videos of herself singing on YouTube.
After seeing the Disney Channel TV series Hannah Montana, she expressed a desire to act as well. In 2009, she entered a singing contest run by Miley Cyrus and was the youngest contestant to finish in the top four. She eventually placed third.
In 2011, she landed her first acting role with a guest appearance, playing a young rape victim on the hit TV series Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
Sabrina's aunt is Nancy Cartwright, best known for providing the voice of Bart Simpson on The Simpsons. Sabrina soon followed in her footsteps by doing voicework on an episode of the TV series Phineas and Ferb in 2012. By 2013, she was playing the recurring role of Young Chloe on Fox's The Goodwin Games. That same year, she had guest roles on Netflix's hit series Orange is the New Black and Disney Channel's Austin & Ally. She also played a role in the feature film Horns (2013), starring Daniel Radcliffe.
Also in 2013, she landed the starring role of Maya Hart on Disney Channel's new series, Girl Meets World (2014 to 2017). Not only was it a dream come true to star on a Disney Channel show, but Boy Meets World had been one of her favorite shows when she was younger, so the series gave her a chance to act with some of her favorite actors from the original series.
On the show, she played one of two girls growing up in New York City, as they grow up, navigate boyfriends and finally, become high school freshmen. When the series ended after three seasons, Sabrina was a star who was very much in demand, both for her singing and acting.
In 2015, Sabrina had released her debut album, Eyes Wide Open and won a Radio Disney Music Award for her song "Can't Blame a Girl For Trying." In December of that year, Sabrina made her stage debut as Wendy in the Pasadena Playhouse's production of Peter Pan and Tinker Bell: A Pirate's Christmas.
Not only did Sabrina perform the theme song for Girl Meets World, a duet with her co-star Rachel Blanchard, but she was also asked to record the theme song for another Disney Channel show, Andi Mack, in 2017, titled "Tomorrow Starts Today."
When Girl Meets World came to an end in 2017, Sabrina was the opening act during a UK Arena Tour with The Vamps and also for Ariana Grande's Dangerous Woman Tour.
In 2018, she made her major feature film debut with a supporting role in the Fox drama The Hate U Give (2018).
In 2019, she played a starring role in the Netflix film Tall Girl (2019) and then starred in the Netflix film Work It (2020), which gave her a chance to show off her considerable dance skills. Following that, she returned to Disney to play a songwriter whose best friend has cancer in Clouds (2020) for the Disney+ streaming service.
On March 10, 2020 Sabrina made her Broadway debut at the August Wilson Theatre in the musical Mean Girls as Cady Heron (the role played by Lindsay Lohan in the film), but the show was cut short after just two performances when Broadway theaters closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sabrina has two older sisters and a half sister. Her sister Sarah sings back up for her. In her spare time, she enjoys sketching.