Berthe Amalie Alver was born in Bergen, Norway. Her parents were Mons Monsen Alver and Ingeborg Lovise Sivertsen. Amalie had 4 brothers. Her parents operated a small business, which went bankrupt when Amalie was 17 years old. Her father emigrated from Norway to the United States to avoid a term of imprisonment and her mother was left with five children to care for.

Her mother pressured Amalie into a marriage with an older man, Bernt Ulrik August Müller (1837 – 1898), a ship captain, later mill owner. Following thirteen years of marriage and the birth of two sons she suffered a nervous breakdown, in part attributed to his infidelity. After several years in a mental hospital, she was divorced from Captain Müller. Together with her two sons, she moved to Kristiania (now Oslo) and began her literary activities. There she met the Kristiania Bohemian community, including writers Arne Garborg and Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, with whom she remained in contact for many years.

In 1884 Amalie Müller married again, this time the Danish writer Erik Skram (1847 – 1923), with whom she moved to Copenhagen, Denmark. They had a daughter from this union. Her obligations as housewife, mother and author as well as the public’s limited acceptance for her then radical work, led to a further breakdown in 1894, after which Amalie lived in a psychiatric hospital near Roskilde. In 1899 her second marriage was dissolved. She died six years later in Copenhagen, Denmark.

In 1882 Amalie Skram debuted (as Amalie Müller) with the short story "Madam Høiers leiefolk", published in the magazine Nyt Tidsskrift. Her work continued until her death. She dealt with topics she knew well.

Her work can be divided into three categories:

• Novels concerning marriage, which explored taboo topics such as female sexuality, and the subservient status of women in that period. These works were perceived by many as overly provocative and resulted in open hostility from some segments of society.
• Multi - generation novels, which dealt with the fate of a family over several generations. With these she explored the social institutions and conditions of the time and campaigned for change.
• Mental hospital works such as Professor Hieronimus and Paa St. Jørgen, which dealt with the primitive and brutal conditions of such institutions of the period. Her novels created a major stir in Denmark and precipitated improvements in these institutions.

She is recognized as an early and strong proponent of what has come to be known as the women's movement, setting the early European trend. Her works, which had been generally forgotten with her death, were rediscovered and received strong recognition in the 1960s. Several of her works are currently available in recent translations to English.

The Amalie Skram-prisen or Amalie Skram prize is a travel stipend that has been awarded annually since 1994 to Norwegian authors who show exceptional skill in addressing women's issues. A statue of Skram, by Maja Refsum (1897 – 1986), was unveiled at Convent Garden (Klosterhaugen) in Bergen 1949. A marble bust by Ambrosia Tønnesen (1859 – 1948) is in Bergen Public Library. She was also honored with a Norwegian postage stamp in 1996.