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After graduating from high school, he began studying business administration at the University of Cologne in 1970, which he completed in 1974. While still studying, Hofer took up odd jobs at Deutsche Welle, WDR and Deutschlandfunk. Hofer completed a traineeship at Deutsche Welle in Cologne from 1974 to 1976. In 1976 he joined Südwestfunk Baden-Baden, where he began working in radio. But in the same year he moved to Saarländischer Rundfunk, where he initially worked in radio at SR1 Europawelle Saar until 1984. In between, Hofer completed a stay in the USA in 1982, where he made school television in Chicago for four months. After his return, he entered German television for the first time in 1984: until 1986 he worked at S3, the regional program of Saarland Radio.
In 1986, the chief anchor of the "Tagesschau", Karl-Heinz Köpcke, brought the young journalist into the ARD news program, for which he worked as a news anchor from then on. In addition to his work at the Tagesschau, Hofer also worked as an editor and presenter of the satirical magazine "Showbiss" at Hessen 3 from 1987 to 1989. He also moderated the NDR talk show from 1989 to 1991 with Margarethe Schreinemakers and other German television personalities. In the first half of the 1990s, Hofer also hosted 60 episodes of the jazz program "Swing Rarities" on ARD. Hofer, already known as a Tagesschau speaker, became even more popular with television audiences through his own talk show, which has been broadcast by MDR since 1992 under the title "Riverboat Talkshow", initially from Dresden and has been broadcast from Leipzig since mid-2000.
Hofer's talk show has now made a name for itself as the most popular and successful talk show on ARD's third programs. At the same time, Hofer appeared as a presenter at the "Golden Europe" German show award ceremony on ARD from 1995 to 1999. He was and is also involved in the production and direction of several television projects for public broadcasters. In addition to his journalistic work on German television, Hofer also works as a business consultant for companies, informing them about communication technology and media manipulation. In 2002, Hofer was named the most popular Tagesschau speaker. Therefore, when the Tagesschau chief anchor Jo Brauner retired in October 2004, he was chosen as his successor: Since mid-October 2004, Hofer has been the new chief announcer for the successful news program on Erste.
The central news program on ARD television has been broadcast since the 1950s and in half a century has only had five chief anchors: Karl-Heinz Köpcke, Werner Veigel, Dagmar Berghoff, Jo Brauner and now Jan Hofer. Since November 2005, Jan Hofer has been an ambassador for the children's hospice of Central Germany for terminally ill children. He is also a special ambassador for the DRK (German Red Cross). From 2011 to 2015 he was a jury member for "Dalli Dalli" and "Das ist Spitze!" with moderator Kai Pflaume. On October 26, 2018, he married for the second time Phong Lan Hofer, née Truong. Together they are parents of a son. He was already the father of three children from his first marriage.
