Both of Akhavan's parents immigrated to the United States following the Iranian Revolution in 1979. Akhavan studied Film and Theatre at Smith College, a women’s college in Northampton, Massachusetts, where she was "a bit of a loner". After graduating in 2007, she studied film directing as a graduate student at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. She also spent a year studying abroad at Queen Mary, University of London. Akhavan made her first short film Two Drink Minimum while studying in London as a graduate student. In 2010, she wrote and directed the short film Nose Job. Akhavan identifies herself as a bisexual woman and a Brooklynite. She has a brother who is a paediatric urologist.  

• Creep 2 (2017)

  
• The Miseducation of Cameron Post (2018)

  
• The Circuit (2016)

  
• Appropriate Behavior (2015)

  
• The Bisexual (2018)