An edge colored graph $G$ is rainbow edge connected if any two vertices are connected by a path whose edges have distinct colors. The rainbow connection of a connected graph $G$, denoted by $rc(G)$, is the smallest number of colors that are needed in order to make $G$ rainbow connected. In this work we study the rainbow connection of the random $r$-regular graph $G=G(n,r)$ of order $n$, where $r\ge 4$ is a constant. We prove that with probability tending to one as $n$ goes to infinity the rainbow connection of $G$ satisfies $rc(G)=O(\log n)$, which is best possible up to a hidden constant.