Selena Gomez, in full Selena Marie Gomez, (born July 22, 1992, Grand Prairie, Texas, U.S.), American actress and singer who won armies of young fans as the winsome star of the Disney television series Wizards of Waverly Place (2007-12) and as a pop vocalist.

Gomez, who was named after the popular Tejano singer Selena Quintanilla-Perez, was raised in suburban Dallas. Inspired by her mother, an amateur actress, Gomez went for a job on the PBS youngsters' television series Barney and Friends and, subsequently, appeared regularly on the program in 2002-04. After making her big-screen debut in the family film Spy Kids three dimensional: Game Over (2003), she auditioned for the Disney Channel, which eventually prompted a visitor spot on the television series The Suite Life of Zack and Cody. In 2007 Gomez was cast as Alex Russo, a naughty tomboy with magical powers, on another Disney sitcom, Wizards of Waverly Place. The show, for which she also sang the theme melody, became an instant hit among the juvenile set, and she earned favorable comparisons to the channel's leading ingenue, Miley Cyrus.

While continuing to star in Wizards of Waverly Place, Gomez acted in various tween-situated recordings and television films and gave a voice to the animated feature Horton Hears a Who! (2008). She then landed lead jobs in the theatrical film Ramona and Beezus (2010), which was based on a youngsters' novel by Beverly Cleary, and the romantic comedy Monte Carlo (2011). Gomez departed from her family-accommodating image with a job as an undergrad seeking adventure in Florida in the lurid Spring Breakers (2012). She then portrayed the sweetheart of an undergrad who is killed in a shooting on campus in the drama Rudderless (2014) and a sorority sister in Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising (2016). Gomez also voiced a character in the animated Hotel Transylvania (2012) and its sequels (2015, 2018) as well as Dolittle (2020). In 2019 she appeared in Jim Jarmusch's zombie film The Dead Don't Die and in Woody Allen's A Rainy Day in New York. She got back to television for Only Murders in the Building (2021-), in which she costarred with Steve Martin and Martin Short as an improbable crime-solving triplet.

Gomez wandered into music as the front woman of Selena Gomez and the Scene, an electronic-influenced pop band that delivered several dance hits. The gathering released the albums Kiss and Tell (2009), A Year Without Rain (2010), and When the Sun Goes Down (2011) preceding announcing its separation in 2012. Gomez then manufactured a performance career with Stars Dance (2013), which featured the tempting single "Come and Get It." Ensuing independent albums included Revival (2015) and Rare (2020), the latter of which yielded the hit ballad "Lose You to Love Me."

As Gomez transitioned into adulthood, her fame was without a doubt magnified by a romantic relationship with pop singer Justin Bieber. She was also known for her philanthropic work, quite a bit of it accomplished through UNICEF, which in 2009 appointed her a generosity ambassador. In 2015 Gomez revealed that she had been diagnosed with lupus. Because of complications from the disease, she had a kidney transplant in 2017.