The Transformation Of Ariel Winter From Childhood To 26

Back in 2009, 11-year-old Ariel Winter was just one of Hollywood's thousands of child actors. Sure, she'd already amassed an impressive roster of screen credits that included several TV guest spots (on series including "Bones," "Ghost Whisperer," and "ER") and as a voice actor in various animated projects, but she was hardly what anyone would define as a child star.

Then came "Modern Family," with Winter cast as middle Dunphy kid Alex, a bespectacled, book-smart firecracker whose constant exasperation with the stupidity of her siblings became an endless source of laughs. When the series became a breakout hit that ran for 11 critically acclaimed seasons — winning 22 Emmys along the way — Winter and her young co-stars in the cast saw their respective stars rise, a group that included her TV siblings Sarah Hyland and Nolan Gould, and young uncle, Manny, played by Rico Rodriguez.

Despite a number of troubling things from her past, Winter went on to define herself in adult roles after "Modern Family" ended its run in 2020. Since then, Winter has positioned herself to build on the success she's already achieved while forging her own distinctive path that promises to take her in some unexpected directions. To find out more about this talented actor and aspiring Hollywood multi-hyphenate, read on to experience the transformation of Ariel Winter from childhood to 26.

Ariel Winter booked her first acting gig when she was just four years old, cast in a TV commercial for Cool Whip. "I was put in the industry when I was four," Winter said of her screen debut in an interview with People. Further roles followed, with more commercials leading to small roles in film and television. And while it's easy to assume the life of a child star is glamorous, Winter found the experience to be soul-crushing. "People criticize you at an extremely young age," she explained. "There's a lot of rejection. I heard no thousands of times. That was hard to cope with."

According to Winter, her mother, Crystal Workman, was the quintessential stage mother, placing a relentless focus on her daughter's career that overshadowed normal childhood activities. "And I didn't have many friends," Winter told Teen Vogue. "It was all about work." When Winter appeared on the 2023 reality show "Stars on Mars," she opened up about her life as a child actor to one of her co-stars, MMA fighter-turned-WWE star Ronda Rousey, who asked Winter if it was her decision to become an actor at such a young age. "You don't really decide anything at four ... My experience was rotten," Winter responded (via the Daily Mail). 

"I love what I do," Winter told People, "But I don't know if it's a choice I would have made on my own."

During her early years as a child actor, Ariel Winter's expressive voice came to bring her opportunities in animation, and she landed voice roles in both animated film and television projects. Among her most high-profile voice acting roles was portraying Gretchen, one of the Fireside Girls, in the Disney Channel cartoon hit "Phineas and Ferb." She ultimately appeared in 21 episodes over the series' run.

She's also been a voice actor in animated films (including "Bambi 2," "Over the Hedge," "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs," and many more), and TV series, ranging from Disney Channel's  "Captain Jake and the Neverland Pilots" to the edgy "Robot Chicken," and also played a female version of Batman's sidekick, Robin, in "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1." In 2012, Winter was cast in the title role in Disney Channel's "Sofia the First," playing a typical young girl who suddenly becomes a princess when her mother marries a king. 

As Winter explained in an interview with Bella, voice acting offered an opportunity to "see a character that someone draws come to life on the screen." Meanwhile, she also appreciated being able to bypass the hair-and-makeup aspect of acting. "You could be in your pajamas. You could just be out of the shower with your hair in a bun and that part's pretty awesome," she mused. 

As Ariel Winter's career as a child actor progressed, she wound up being cast in progressively bigger projects, all of which led to becoming a series regular on "Modern Family" at the age of 11. 

She went on to play Alex for more than a decade. Fans of the sitcom watched her grow up before their eyes, transforming over the years from an awkward preadolescent to a stunning young woman. "It's pretty insane that I've basically spent half of my life on the show," Winter, then 22, mused during a 2020 appearance on "Good Morning America" to discuss the final season of "Modern Family." As she explained, the experience of portraying a make-believe family on a TV show created what was, for all intents and purposes, an actual family. "He is, in my mind, 100% my brother," she said of onscreen sibling Nolan Gould. "I love Nolan to pieces because we grew up together ... just growing pains of being teenagers and kids and being so close in age, being able to relate to each other — and Rico [Rodriguez] — that's been a beautiful thing for us," she added.

"It's brought a lot of opportunities and a lot of crazy things," she told interviewer George Satsidis of how the show had raised her profile in Hollywood. "It's now, like, I go in public, and people recognize me, and they want to take pictures with me, and they know my name."

Ariel Winter came to discover that there was a dark side to her fame. As she explained in an interview with Schön!, she experienced some difficult years as an adolescent due to comments on social media criticizing her physical appearance. "I really struggled," she admitted. "It really breaks down your confidence when a lot of people you don't know have an opinion of everything you do and the way you look, and their opinions are never really positive." 

She offered more detail when she appeared on "Red Table Talk: The Estefans," revealing she'd been prescribed antidepressants that resulted in a significant weight gain, resulting in online trolls fat-shaming her. "It was rough online," she said, recalling the "overwhelming amount of negativity and sexualization" directed at her when she was a teenager. "People on the internet really suck," she told Teen Vogue. "It bothered me for so many years — I mean, it still does. It never goes away."

Not surprisingly, Winter came to become wary of social media, realizing that numerous positive messages of support she received could be undone by a single negative comment. "And then you have 3,000 comments on a photo you post that you feel like you looked good in ... but, like, the ones that stick out the majority in your mind are these horrible comments," she said while interviewed for the "Chicks in the Office" podcast.

In addition to coping with online hate, Ariel Winter's success on "Modern Family" also enflamed tensions between her and her mother, Crystal Workman. It all came to a head in 2012 when Winter began seeking to become an emancipated minor. That led to a guardianship hearing in November of that year, when a judge removed Winter from her mother's custody after hearing Winter's allegations of continual physical and emotional abuse. Workman denied her daughter's accusations. "I would never abuse her in any way and I have always tried my best to always protect her and do what is right for her," she said in a statement issued to E! News.

After about two years of legal wrangling, in May 2015 Winter was finally granted her request. "I am now officially emancipated!!!" she tweeted.

In a 2017 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Winter alleged her mother had sexualized her at an early age, forcing her to wear skimpy, revealing outfits when she was still a preteen. "People thought I was 24 when I was 12," Winter said. "If there was going to be a nude scene when I was that age, my mother would have a thousand percent said yes." The situation became particularly fraught when she was 13 and 14, prior to when she began the emancipation process. "I went through a really rough period, a really bad chapter," she admitted.

Growing up on camera is never easy for any child actor. For Ariel Winter, however, the onset of puberty was impossible to avoid during her early years on "Modern Family." "The first season I was very thin, no breasts, no hips," Winter told The Hollywood Reporter. "The next year, I had huge boobs and a butt."

As she explained in an interview with Glamour, the transition from skinny kid to curvy teen was hardly a gradual one. "It really did happen overnight," she said of her rapid physical maturation. Yet that was just the beginning; as she grew older, so too did the size of her breasts. "I was 15 years old with [size] F [breasts]," Winter recalled. "It's like, 'How do you navigate that?'"

Explaining that large breasts run in her family, she decided to undergo breast reduction surgery, initially just informing friends and family before making the decision to go public. Reducing the size of her breasts wasn't just a response to seeing more press coverage of her cleavage than her acting accomplishments; there was also a very practical reason that led her to surgery. "I was in excruciating pain," she explained during an appearance on "Good Morning America." "I couldn't sit up straight. It was always super uncomfortable for me to sleep. It was uncomfortable to sit. It was uncomfortable to walk."

In 2019, Ariel Winter was still starring in "Modern Family" when she was cast as a guest star on "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit." For Winter, the opportunity to showcase her skills as a dramatic actor after a decade of being best known for her comedy chops wasn't the only attraction to the role. "It's my favorite show ever," she told Entertainment Weekly, revealing that she'd watched every episode ever produced. 

Not surprisingly, sharing scenes with longtime "L&O: SVU" star Mariska Hargitay was quite literally a dream come true for her. "It was one of the best experiences I've ever had, to be honest," Winter added. "She is one of my favorite people in the world ... Obviously, an incredible actress, but just as a person, she is just so incredible."

However, starring on one show and guest-starring on another — especially when they film on different coasts — was not without its challenges. As Winter explained, immediately after completing production of "SVU" in New York, she flew to L.A. to start work on the swan song season of "Modern Family," with no break between the two shoots. "I was like, 'I don't care. I will make it work. I will be exhausted. I do not care. I will be on my favorite show!'" she explained in an interview with E! News.

Ariel Winter did not have a typical childhood, and that was certainly true of her education. Having spent most of her life being home-schooled or taught by on-set tutors, in the fall of 2017, she enrolled at UCLA. During an appearance on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!," Winter revealed that her ultimate goal was to become a lawyer, admitting that while she planned on continuing acting, she also wanted to have another skill to fall back on. "Because I could work today, and never work [again] a day in my life," she explained. 

While she was initially confident that she could juggle "Modern Family" and her studies, it didn't take long for Winter to discover that plan was simply not feasible. The following March, she decided to put college on hold. "I do love UCLA, but at the moment I'm taking a break from it so I can continue to pursue my career and also try to have a little bit more of a life because I've been so busy," she said in an interview with "Entertainment Weekly."

That "break" wound up becoming longer than anticipated; in July 2019, she revealed that she eventually dropped out altogether but was hopeful to someday return. "I loved going [to UCLA]; however, I overestimated what I could do at that time ... I wasn't really able to get to the majority of my classes," she told The Hollywood Reporter.

Having worked professionally in Hollywood since the age of four, Ariel Winter is well aware of the vagaries of an actor's life. As a result, she began looking for ways to take control of her career, which crystallized in the form of the 2020 comedy-thriller "Don't Log Off." Not only was she cast in a leading role — co-starring with her boyfriend, actor Luke Benward — she was also a producer on the project. Set during the quarantine phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, the film's plot involves several friends celebrating a birthday via Zoom, who are then faced with a mystery when the birthday girl suddenly vanishes.

For Winter, transitioning from child actor to producer was a natural progression, building upon the lifetime of knowledge she'd accumulated while growing up on film and television sets. "I've always been super interested in producing," Winter explained during an interview with Brief Take, admitting that she'd always felt that she'd had a knack for the organizational aspects of producing. "People were always like, 'You know, I think you'd be great at that.' In my mind I was like, 'I think I really would love that, being able to handle all of the day-to-day work ..."

Producing and a possible legal career aren't Ariel Winter's only interests beyond acting. Over the years, she's also become highly vocal about her love of animals and has used her platform to promote pet rescue facilities. In a lengthy Instagram post in which she displayed a new tattoo of her dog, Chloe, she explained that she had previously only had one dog, which wasn't a rescue. "When I decided to get a second dog, I was introduced to rescue and immediately knew I wanted to learn more and get involved," she wrote. "After doing some research, I chose to rescue."

Not only is Winter an advocate for pet rescue, but she's also hopeful that one day, she could launch her own rescue shelter. "I don't want to make just a regular shelter. We have those," she told Elite Daily, outlining her ambitious plan for a shelter that would cope with the reality that some rescued animals will never find a home, and will spend the rest of their lives there. "I want to make a really nice center for these dogs because a lot of senior dogs die in the shelter. That breaks my heart," she said. "I would like for a senior dog to live out the rest of its days happy."

Ariel Winter has never been shy about opening up about her mental health. During an interview with Teen Vogue, she revealed that she saw a therapist twice a week and was also taking antidepressants. From her perspective, the stigma surrounding discussions of mental health made no sense. "What's negative and wrong and embarrassing about bettering your life?" she asked. "Isn't that what everyone wants — to be better and feel healthier and be happier?"

Getting to the point at which she's arrived, however, hadn't been easy, particularly with determining which medication worked best for her and at what dosage. "I started in therapy when I was 15, and I think I got on medication probably when I was, like, 16," Winter explained during a sit-down with the "Broad Ideas with Rachel Bilson & Olivia Allen" podcast. "And it was a really hard journey to find the right ones. It took a really long time."

Ariel Winter has been dating Disney star Luke Benward since 2019, with the two bonding over their shared experience of being child actors (Benward made his screen debut at age five in the film "We Were Soldiers"). Since then, the couple have often appeared together on red carpets, and are frequently seen on each other's social media posts.

One post, however, stirred up controversy when some of her followers detected what they perceived to be a problem in the relationship. It all stemmed from a TikTok video of Winter demonstrating how to cook stuffed bell peppers, with Benward making a brief cameo appearance to shred some cheese. While many of the comments expressed surprise that the two actors were an item, one raised Winter's hackles. As BuzzFeed News reported, when one commenter wrote about how lucky Winter was to have Benward for a boyfriend, another wrote, "Is she tho? There's been so many rumors about him controlling her."

Winter dialed up the sarcasm when she issued a withering response. "Guys please help. He's forcing me on OnlyFans so he can be my manager and he doesn't let me out of the house!!! SOS!!!!" She got serious by adding, "Don't believe everything you see on [TikTok], especially rumors like that :). He's a great man, and if he wasn't, the dogs would take his ass outside."