At age 18, the fresh-faced footy jock from Detroit, Michigan, has Hollywood in the palm of his hands.
Following his role as heartthrob Jacob Black in the teen film juggernaut, Lautner has become one of the most in-demand young stars in Tinseltown.
He was reportedly offered $8.5 million for a role he eventually turned down, a sum that would have made him the highest-paid teen actor in LA.
"Really? I didn't know that," Lautner tells Hit at the ritzy Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills.
Wearing a grey V-neck jumper and dark denim jeans, Lautner looks like a regular high school senior who has spruced up for a weekend date.
If not for the Twilight series, he probably would be a high school senior.
"Right now I'd be getting ready to go to college. I'd be playing football," he says.
"I might have continued playing football."
Or he might have pursued his passion for cinema with an off-screen role.
"I love the stuff behind the camera as well - writing, producing, who knows, directing," he says.
Instead, he is a teenage millionaire who dates pop stars and drives a $100,000 sports car.
The hype surrounding Lautner in the third Twilight film, Eclipse, rivals that of the series' wildly popular leading man, Robert Pattinson.
Directed by David Slade, the next instalment ramps up the tension with more action scenes and a heavy focus on the love triangle between werewolf Jacob Black (Lautner), vampire Edward Cullen (Pattinson) and mortal Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart).
An army of young vampires, led by Adelaide-born actor Xavier Samuel as Riley, is out to hunt down and eradicate Bella as Jacob and Edward vie for her affection.
Eclipse has all the trimmings that dedicated Twilighters have come to expect.
Lautner bares his famous abdominal muscles, which he sculpts through 90-minute gym workouts five days a week.
Pattinson and Stewart gaze deep into each other's eyes, tortured by forbidden longing.
Pale-faced teenagers, including Samuel, swoop from the woods to ambush enemies.
"Xavier is a terrific villain," Lautner says. "He's a great guy, a lot of fun."
Eclipse promises to pull crowds worldwide, trading on the momentum of Twilight (2008) and New Moon (2009) which have made $1.25 billion at the international box office.
Lautner never dreamed Twilight would catapult him to such dizzy heights.
"When we were filming Twilight none of us had any idea what it was going to be," Lautner says. "We started meeting fans face to face and that's the first moment I think when we realised this could be something more than your average movie. From there it just kept growing and growing."
He has read Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series and nominates Eclipse as his favourite.
"It's really the first where the three of them are all together. Bella is literally being torn between the two guys," he says.
"It's definitely darker and the action level keeps getting stepped up with each film and as a guy I like that."
His profile rises with each film, too - the series has opened many doors for him in Hollywood.
In July, he starts filming the thriller Abduction and next year, he takes up the title role in a film about the toy hero Stretch Armstrong.
He was tagged to star in sci-fi movie Max Steel and Northern Lights, too, but he had to back out because of his rapidly filling dance card.
(Incidentally, Australia's Liam Hemsworth is in contention for the role instead.)
There has also been talk he would be cast in thriller Cancun, but he says that role has not yet been confirmed.
Either way, the child star who made his break as Sharkboy five years ago knows that Twilight has made his career.
"This franchise has been a great platform for me and it's really great to be able to work with a role over and over again," he says.
He flunked his first ever audition - for a Burger King commercial - at age seven but quickly realised that he loved the camera.
"I was nine years old and I was like, 'Mom, Dad, this is what I want to do'," he says.
So his parents moved him and his sister, who is seven years his junior, to LA.
Now, barely 10 years later, he has dated pop princess Taylor Swift and gets around in a slick white Audi.
Lately he has taken to wearing a baseball cap in public to reduce the chance he will be noticed by an adoring fan.
"You get recognised. There's definitely a bit of craziness but it's a good crazy," he says.
He can't help but smile each time a mother and daughter approach him for an autograph.
"The mums are even more passionate than the daughters."
Still, it takes some adjustment. "It's definitely different. You have to go about things in different ways, you have to be smart," he says.
"You can't go, 'I want to go to this restaurant on Friday night at 7pm'," he says. "You have to think about things and choose wise places, but you don't want to let it affect your life too much because that's where it will drive you crazy."
Unlike bad-boy actor Charlie Sheen, Lautner chooses not to disguise himself with a Charlie Chaplin moustache when he leaves the house. "No, the occasional hat but no moustache," he says, laughing.
So will he stick with the franchise if it goes beyond the fourth film, due out in November, Breaking Dawn?
"If there are 107 films then no, but we're doing Breaking Dawn," he says.
Eventually, he wants to try drama and maybe even comedy - but the Twilight series remains a priority for now.
Now, the million-dollar question. What is Lautner looking for in a girlfriend?
"She has to be loyal, honest and trustworthy and she has to be willing to just be herself and laugh."
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
