Neva Small was born in New York City to Seldan and Berma Small. She grew up in Central Park West. Her mother graduated in the first class of Harpists at Juilliard in 1938, and played in an all-female orchestra at the Waldorf Astoria.

Small began singing in an extracurricular after-school program, and acted in Hebrew school and in the Jewish Theater for Children, where she was an understudy for Don Scardino. At age 10, she played Beverly Sills' daughter in The Ballad of Baby Doe (1963) at the New York City Opera.

Small made her Broadway debut in the 1964 musical Something More! Other early Broadway stage credits include The Impossible Years (1965–1967), Henry, Sweet Henry (1967), Frank Merriwell (1971), and Something's Afoot (1976).

In 1966, at the age of 14, Small recorded four singles for the MGM Records label.

Her early Off-Broadway performances include Ballad for a Firing Squad (1968) and Show Me Where the Good Times Are (1970). She turned down a part in Godspell to play the title character in F. Jasmine Addams, the first musical staged at Circle in the Square Theatre, in 1971. Based on the novel The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers, the one-act play was cancelled after six performances.

Small made her film debut as Chava, the third of Tevye's five daughters, in the 1971 film adaptation of the long-running Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof. Her character leaves the Jewish faith to marry a gentile. While Small had wanted to audition for the original Broadway show, she was told by the play's producers that she "wasn't Jewish enough". She screen-tested for the characters of both Hodel and Chava, and won the latter role. Since she was under 18, she required a guardian during the filming; her older sister Gail assumed this role.

In 2004, Small recorded her only solo album, My Place in the World (Small Penny Enterprises Records). This compilation of melodies that she sang during her stage and film career is noted for including "many generally obscure show tunes".

Small has continued to act and sing in musical productions. In 2007 she starred in the one-woman show Neva Small: Not Quite an Ingenue, a theatrical revue based on her musical career, at The Actors' Temple.