Who is Phoebe Gates? Bill Gates' daughter who revealed he has Asperger syndrome
Phoebe Gates is Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates’ daughter. She is an entrepreneur and advocate for women’s health and empowerment.
Billionaire Bill Gates’ 22-year-old daughter Phoebe Gates recently revealed in a podcast that her father has Asperger syndrome, reported the New York Post. She made the revelation on Alex Cooper’s “Call Her Daddy” podcast and also talked about how it was when her boyfriends met her father.
According to the United States’ National Centre for Biotechnology Information, Asperger syndrome is a neurodevelopmental disorder within the family of autism spectrum disorder. It is characterized by impaired social communication and interaction, average or superior intelligence, and no significant language delay.
Who is Phoebe Gates
Phoebe Gates is Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates’ daughter. According to her LinkedIn, she is an entrepreneur and advocate for women’s health and empowerment.
She graduated from Stanford University in 2024 with a degree in Human Biology and works closely with global and domestic healthcare leaders and advocacy organizations.
Reproductive Freedom for All (RFFA), a pro-choice non-profit organisation recognised Phoebe as its 2024 “Rising Reproductive Freedom Champion”.
“With the fundamental belief that the freedom to make decisions about one’s personal health unlocks everything - educational, financial and family opportunity - she works in pursuit of being a catalyst for change, and to inspire a new generation of women in business,” says her LinkedIn bio.
Phoebe co-founded a digital fashion platform ‘Phia’ alongside her Stanford peer Sophia Kianni and also interned at the British Vogue.
Phoebe Gates, who a New York Times article called “the youngest and most stylish of Bill and Melinda Gates’s children”, is also widely popular on social media. She has 506k followers on Instagram.
What Phoebe Gates said
Appearing on the ‘Call Her Daddy’ podcast, Phoebe Gates talked about how awkward it was when her boyfriends met her father, however, she found it funny. “For the guy, terrifying. For me, it’s hilarious because my dad’s pretty socially awkward. Like he’s said before, he has Asperger’s. So, like to me, it’s so funny,” she said.
Bill Gates, 69, has never publicly said that he has Asperger’s syndrome. However, he has in the past claimed that he most likely had autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
“If I were growing up today, I probably would be diagnosed on the autism spectrum. During my childhood, the fact that some people’s brains process information differently from others wasn’t widely understood. My parents had no guideposts or textbooks to help them grasp why their son became so obsessed with certain projects, missed social cues, and could be rude and inappropriate without seeming to notice his effect on others," he wrote in his 2025 memoir, “Source Code.”
