Obesity and type 2 diabetes are both significant contributors to the contemporary pan-demic of non‐communicable diseases. Both disorders are interconnected and associated with the disruption of normal homeostasis in adipose tissue. Consequently, exploring adipose tissue differentiation and homeostasis is important for the treatment and prevention of metabolic disorders. The aim of this work is to review the consecutive steps in the postnatal development of adipocytes, with a special emphasis on in vivo studies. We gave particular attention to well‐known transcription factors that had been thoroughly described in vitro, and showed that the in vivo research of adipo-genic differentiation can lead to surprising findings.