Wang Tao was born in about the third year of Zongzhang of Tang Dynasty (670) and died in the fourteenth year of Tianbao (755). He was a native of (now Shaanxi County). His great-grandfather Wang Gui was the prime minister of Taizong Dynasty. His grandfather was Chongji, his father was Maoshi, and Wang Tao was the second son. His elder brother was Guangda, a doctor named Si Xun. Tao had two sons, the eldest son Sui was once the minister of Dali Temple, and the second son Fu was once the governor of Suzhou.

Wang Tao was sickly in his childhood and loved medicine in his old age. His mother had been ill for many years. He felt that people who did not know the medicine should not be a filial son, so he determined to study medicine. In the early 8th century, he worked at the Hongwen Museum (National Library of the Tang Dynasty). ) for more than twenty years, during which he read thousands of volumes of ancient medical literature. All books read were collected and recorded, and a large amount of information was accumulated. During the Tianbao period (742-755), he was demoted to Fangling (now part of Hubei) for some reason, and later went to guard Daning. At a time when local diseases were prevalent, Wang took the recorded classical formulas and applied them himself, and many of the sick were cured, so he determined to compile a comprehensive collection of medical prescriptions. In the eleventh year of Tianbao (752), Waitai Miyao was written in forty volumes. His other work The Synopsis of Famous Stages, in ten volumes, is a simplified version of Waitai Miyao, but unfortunately it has been lost.