Born somewhere in Virginia (contrary to the popular belief that he was born in Washington D.C.), he was adopted as an infant into a Westchester County, New York, family with theatrical links.

Albee attended the Rye Country Day School in New York, then the Lawrenceville School in New Jersey, where he was expelled. He then was sent to Valley Forge Military Academy in Wayne, Pennsylvania, where he graduated in 1945 at the age of 17. He next enrolled in the graduate studies program at Choate prep school in Connecticut, graduating in 1946. His formal education continued at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, where he was expelled in 1947 for skipping classes and refusing to attend compulsory chapel.

Albee did not begin writing until he was 30. The less than diligent student later dedicated much of his time to promoting American university theatre, frequently speaking at campuses and serving as a distinguished professor at the University of Houston from 1989 to 2003. His plays belong to the drama of the absurd.

His acclaimed Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, depicting a dysfunctional marriage, was said by some critics to portray gay relationships, with the female characters really men in drag.

In 2008, in celebration of his eightieth birthday, numerous Albee plays are being mounted in distinguished Off Broadway venues, including the historic Cherry Lane Theatre, where the playwright himself is directing two of his one-acts, The American Dream and The Sandbox, which were produced at the theater in 1961 and 1962, respectively.