Simone Biles and Jonathan Owens’s Relationship: A Complete Timeline
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Simone Biles and Jonathan Owens met the way most couples do these days: on a dating app. The Olympic gymnast and Green Bay Packers safety connected just before the pandemic and married three years later, in April 2023.
Besides being incredible athletes—the greatest gymnast of all time, in Biles’s case—the two have bonded over their shared sense of humor and love for their pets. (When they began dating, she had two bulldogs; he had one.) “I’ll show up at her house, and her dogs will peek around her looking for my dog,” Owens told Texas Monthly in June 2021. “They’ve become best friends.”
Biles and Owens are best friends too. “This was a match made in heaven,” he gushed to Texas Monthly. “There’s no better person for me. She loves me, she’s so affectionate. I just love that. And it’s just intoxicating seeing how much work she puts into everything.”
See Simone Biles and Jonathan Owens’s relationship timeline below.
March 2020
Biles and Owens connect on Raya just before the pandemic lockdown begins. But when they slide into each other’s DMs, Owens doesn't realize he's in the presence of greatness. “I didn’t know who she was,” he told Texas Monthly in June 2021. “I just hadn’t heard of her, and when I told her that, that’s one of the things she liked.”
He added that the timing—which easily could have ended the relationship before it even began—actually helped them build a foundation. “We ended up hanging out right before the pandemic,” he said. “It was one of the few times in her life where everything was just shut off and she couldn’t do anything. So we used it to get to know each other—really get to know each other. It created our bond and made it stronger. Now I’m so thankful.”
Biles echoed this in her own cover interview with Glamour in 2021. “I lived, I traveled, I did things I couldn’t do because of gymnastics,” she said of that time. “I just had fun.”
August 2020
After a few months of dating, the couple make it Instagram-official. Biles posts a cute photo of the two with the caption “it's just us.”
A few weeks later, she follows that with another photo that’s captioned, “the only time I fall is when he’s there to catch me.”
September 2020
Biles makes her Instagram debut on Owens’s feed a month later. He captions the post, “Now you rockin with a real one.”
December 2020
Biles and Owens spend Christmas and New Year’s Eve together. “Always good to spend Christmas with the fam,” Owens writes in the caption of his photo, which shows the couple wearing matching pajamas. In between the holidays, Biles cheers on her NFL-player boyfriend at a game.
“Her energy is something,” Owens told Texas Monthly. “She’s always happy, giggly, bubbly. If I’ve had a tough day at the office, I wouldn’t want to take that home to her. Her personality, man….”
February 2021
Biles and Owens celebrate Valentine’s Day with an elaborate setup, complete with balloons, a giant “love” sign, and rose petals. “Lucky to be loved by you,” Biles writes in the caption of her photo.
March 2021
To celebrate their one-year anniversary and Biles’s 24th birthday, the couple takes a vacation together to Belize. “I love you more than i love Belize and thats a lot,” Biles writes on Instagram. (The gymnast holds dual citizenship in the country.) “My travel partner forever,” she writes on another selfie.
June 2021
Over a year into their relationship, Owens is finally able to see his girlfriend compete for the first time at the US gymnastics championships. (Biles will go on to win her seventh national all-around title.) “What an amazing experience,” Owens writes on Instagram. “First time getting to watch you compete in person and you didn’t disappoint. It’s so cool that i get to watch you do what you love, and be the best at that ‼️ I’m so proud of you my lil champ. Trials up next and you already know I’m there!! Love you baby.”
Later that month, at the Olympic trials in St. Louis, Owens shows his support by wearing a T-shirt bearing a quote from Biles. He also brings flowers to celebrate when she qualifies for the Tokyo Games.
July 2021
After Biles withdraws from two Olympic events, Owens shares his support and love on Instagram. “Imma ride with you through whatever baby,” he writes. “Your strength and courage is unmatched and you inspire me more and more everyday SB. You always gone be my champ baby and don’t you ever forget that, i love you so much and i can’t wait till you come home and i get to see that beautiful smile again. You know I’m always here for you baby.”
Biles comments on the post, “I love you so much.”
August 2021
When Biles returns to the Olympic spotlight to compete in the individual balance beam finals, she wins a bronze medal. Owens takes to Instagram Stories shortly after to celebrate her win. “Words can’t express how proud of you I am right now,” he writes.
The feeling is mutual. After returning to the United States, Biles stops by the NFL training camp to cheer on her boyfriend. “Open practices a.k.a. bring your girlfriend to work day,” she jokes on Instagram. Owens comments on her post, “So glad you got to come out baby.”
On August 8, Biles shared her own pics from another visit, this time wearing an “OWENS” T-shirt. “Another day another practice ❤️,” she wrote alongside the sweet moment.
On August 15, the pair have a spur-of-the-moment “sunset photoshoot.”
While Biles is “beaching until further notice” during a girls’ weekend, Owens plays in a preseason game against the Dallas Cowboys on August 21. Biles supports her boyfriend from afar, writing, “Sending you love & well wishes from vacation I'll be cheering you on! Go #16!” She wrote the message alongside a screenshot from their video chat, per People, adding, “I love you so much. & so so so proud of you.”
On August 27, Biles marks passing their one-year anniversary with a funny Instagram post. “Oops I forgot to tell y’all that we’ve been dating for more than a year,” Biles captions two new photos with Owens. “So happy past 1 year to the best thing that’s ever happened to you: ME 🤍🤣.”
Owens shared her post on his Instagram stories, writing, “my heart.”
February 2022
Owens and Biles now have a new title for their relationship: fiancés. They announced their engagement via mutual Instagram posts on Tuesday, February 15. “THE EASIEST YES,” Biles captions her post. “I can’t wait to spend forever & ever with you, you’re everything I dreamed of and more! let’s get married FIANCÉ.”
Owens responded in the comments, “Ready for forever with you ❤️”
In his own proposal post, Owens writes, “Woke up this morning with a fiancée 💍❤️.”
March 2022
After wedding dress shopping, the pair goes on a romantic vacation to Turks and Caicos.
During their trip, Owens shares a tribute to his partner for her 25th birthday, writing, “Want to wish my beautiful fiancée a happy birthday!!! What’s a better place to bring it in than paradise 🤪🍾 Looking forward to making endless memories with you on this journey of life together, everything happens for a reason and it’s obvious we were made for each other ❤️ Here’s to your best birthday yet, and we just getting started!!!! More surprises to come 👀😘 I love you more than you would ever know baby ❤️❤️ #twentyfiiiiine 🥵.”
December 2022
Just in time for the holidays, Biles gifts her fans photos and videos from her festive engagement photo shoot with Owens.
For the rest of the photos, which can be seen here, Biles is in a slinky red slip dress and matching wide-brim hat, and Owens is in a striped jacket and white ensemble. The happy couple pose in front of snow-covered pine trees for that December flair.
April 2023
In mid-April, Biles teases her upcoming nuptials on Instagram with a marriage license selfie. “Almost time to say ‘I do,’” she captions the post.
On April 22, Biles reveals she married Owens with a series of stunning photos in her sheer tiered wedding dress. “I do 🤍 officially owens 🤍,” she captions the post, which you can see here.
Celebrity News
“Officially Owens.”
May 2023
The pair follows up their low-key courthouse ceremony with a lavish destination wedding in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.
Biles walks down the aisle wearing a sheer corset gown with floral embellishments by designer Galia Lahav. “I think this is exactly how brides are supposed to feel,” Biles said in a Vogue video from her final dress fitting. “Luxurious, beautiful, kind of on top of the world.”
December 2023
In late December, the pair goes viral for less-than-romantic reasons. During a joint appearance on The Pivot podcast, Owens repeats that he “didn't know” who Biles when she reached out to him on the Raya dating app back in 2020. While many viewers learned this detail for the first time find that hard to believe, the rest of the conversation raised even more eyebrows.
“When she won the Olympics, I was in college and we didn't have NBC, we didn't have Olympics channels,” he tells the podcast hosts, noting that he realized “she's gotta be good” because she had “a bunch of followers” on Instagram. Throughout the conversation he continues to emphasize the ways she sought him out, including messaging first, liking his Instagram posts, and driving 45 minutes to meet him for their first date.
In response to being asked if he felt he was the “catch” in the relationship, Owens says, “I always say that the men are the catch,” adding that he was initially “fighting” their connection because he wasn't ready to “commit.”
“I'm like, 'It's kinda early.’ But you know, it happens when you least expect it,” Owens continues. “When we hung out, we just hit it off instantly. Laughed the whole night.”
Meanwhile, Simone Biles pushes back at one host's statement that Owens “will never be as good as a safety as this little motherfucker is as a gymnast.”
She responds, "“ou know what, he might. Because the other day I said, ‘You know what, in a couple of years nobody is going to call him Simone Biles’s husband. They’ll call me Jonathan Owens’s wife.”
Let's just say the interview goes over poorly (as you can see here). “This is really odd that you would degrade your wife like this on a public platform,” one Instagram user comments on an Instagram clip. “You will forever be known as Simone Biles’s husband. You’re not the catch lmao.”
In an apparent response to the backlash, Owens posts a sweet photo from their destination wedding to Instagram. “Unbothered 😂❤️,” he captions the post on December 21. “Just know we locked in over here 🤞🏽.”
In the comments, Biles adds, “for life.”
This does not stop fans from continuing to critique their dynamic online. In fact, it quickly becomes a TikTok trend to ask someone whether they know about Simone Biles and then ask whether they've heard of her husband. For the most part, the videos go like this:
After days of discourse, Simone Biles takes to X.com with one question: “Are y'all done yet?”
On December 26, Peacock drops the 2023 Back That Year Up special, featuring an interview with Simone Biles. During her chat with Kevin Hart and Kenan Thompson, which was likely filmed before the Pivot podcast went viral, she reveals that she and Owens argue over who the better athlete is in terms of “difficulty, ability, and all that stuff,” with Biles arguing that “gymnastics is harder—if he agrees or not.”
“We fought over it a couple of times and then we vowed—once we got married—we wouldn’t talk about it again,” Biles says, per Page Six. “But it keeps coming up every time. But he has done my workout in the gym and he could barely do it and then I went to their NFL workout and I crushed it.” Doesn't that kind of answer the question?
January 2024
Simone Biles wears a “J” for Jonathan on her neck at a Green Bay Packers game.
March 2024
Simone Biles celebrates Owens's move to the Chicago Bears on X.com, writing, “CHICAGO HERE HE COMES.”
On March 14, Owens shares a birthday tribute to Biles on Instagram, promising to “support” his wife during this “special year.” Presumably, he's referring to her plans to compete in the 2024 Paris Olympics.
“Happy birthday to the most beautiful soul, my amazing wife,” he writes on Instagram. “So crazy to me how life aligns you with the person that you’re meant to be with, you’ve made me a better man in so many ways I can’t explain it. My heart, my rock and my best friend all in one. I love you so much baby, this is going to be a special year for you and i can’t wait to support you every step along the way 🤎.”
This post will be updated as more information becomes available.
Originally Appeared on Glamour
