Adnan was born and educated in Dhaka, Bangladesh. After completing his undergraduate studies at Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), he moved to the United States for graduate studies in 2001, and has lived there ever since.

In 2007, while living in Massachusetts, he helped found House of Volunteers along with Sudipta Sarkar, an MIT student at the time. He currently works as a software engineer and lives in California.