Barbi Benton was born Barbara Klein to a Jewish family in New York on January 28, 1950. By 1952, her family had moved to Sacramento, California when her father, a military doctor, was assigned new duties there. Benton attended Rio Americano High School in Sacramento before heading for Los Angeles at age 16, where she began modeling to supplement her allowance.

By the time she met Hugh Hefner in 1968, she was getting regular work on television shows including Playboy After Dark which filmed A-list entertainers performing in Hugh Hefner's mansion surrounded by Playboy Playmates. Benton said she pretended to be Hefner's girlfriend for a couple of episodes and soon found herself living the role full time. She was on her way to becoming a multifaceted icon of 1970s glamor. Shortly after meeting Hefner, at his suggestion, she changed her name to the more showbiz-friendly Barbi Benton. "When he asked me out," Barbi recalls, "I was 18 and he was 42. I said I'd never gone out with anyone older than 24, and he said, 'That's all right. Neither have I.' We hit it off right away, and it lasted for eight years!"