Son of film producer R. B. Choudary, he started his career as a child actor in his father's films in 1996.

Jiiva was born as Amar to film producer R. B. Choudary and Mahjabeen on 4 January 1984 in Chennai, Tamil Nadu.

He is the youngest of four brothers. His eldest brother B. Suresh is a co-producer in their home banner Super Good Films, while his second brother Jeevan is an entrepreneur in the steel industry.

His third brother is Jithan Ramesh, an actor in the Tamil film industry.

On 21 November 2007, Jiiva married his childhood friend Supriya in New Delhi.

Supriya is a MBA graduate and an interior designer by profession. The two first met in 1994 when he was studying in a school in T Nagar. They have a son named Sparsh" born in 2010.

From 1998 to 2002, he learned Mansuria Kung Fu under the supervision of R. Shekhar.

Jiiva was a judge on STAR Vijay's reality dance competition Jodi Number One in its third season along with Sangeetha and Aishwarya Rajinikanth.

In mid-2011, he announced that he would start a film production company called Spiral Dreams with his brother Jithan Ramesh in order to promote new directors like his father.