'Dilbert' Creator Scott Adams Dead at 68
Dilbert creator Scott Adams has died after a battle with metastatic prostate cancer, The New York Times reported. He was 68 years old.
The news comes just one day after Shelly Miles, who was married to the popular cartoonist from 2006 until 2014, told TMZ that Adams had entered hospice care at his Northern California home. Miles explained that Adams began receiving “end-of-life care” at his home last week as his health continued to “rapidly” decline. According to Miles, a round-the-clock team of nurses and health professionals had been “coming in and out” of Adams’ house while she said that she, her sister, and the Adams’ stepdaughter, Savannah, had been aiding in the cartoonist's care during his final days.
Adams Revealed His Diagnosis in May 2025
Miles’ tragic update comes less than a year after Adams revealed in May 2025 that he was diagnosed with metastatic prostate cancer. Adams stipulated that he’d been dealing with the disease for some time before his public announcement. However, shortly before informing his fans of the diagnosis, Adams was told by doctors that the cancer had spread to his bones and progressed to Stage 4.
On Jan. 1, Adams made another harrowing update on his Real Coffee with Scott Adams podcast. “I talked to my radiologist yesterday, and it’s all bad news — the odds of me recovering are essentially zero,” he said earlier this month. “I’ll give you any updates if that changes, but it won’t. So there’s no chance that I’ll get my feeling back in my legs, and I’ve got some ongoing heart failure, which is making it difficult to breathe sometimes during the day. However, you should prepare yourself that January will probably be a month of transition, one way or another.”
Despite the dire circumstances, Adams told his fans that he hadn’t “made any decisions” regarding end-of-life care. “But it was all bad news, no good news at all,” he reiterated. “So I will keep doing this as long as it makes sense—because I like doing it, it keeps me busy. I have much bigger problems than the stuff I’m talking about in the news. But I’m so interested in what’s happening in the world,” he added, revealing that he was still working on new cartoons during his cancer battle.
Adams Courted Controversy with Racist Remarks in 2023
Dilbert was created in 1989 and is still published in newspapers around the globe. An animated sitcom based upon the strip ran for two seasons between 1999 and 2000 on UPN. In 2023, more than 80 newspapers stopped publishing the strip after Adams made racist remarks on his podcast, calling Black people a “hate group” and urging white people to “just get the hell away.” Despite the controversy, Adams has continued hosting the podcast and writing the comic strip.