Her career began in 1993 in Hong Kong, and she gained early fame in Taiwan through a series of successful albums in Mandarin, establishing herself as an icon in Asia.

Her diverse cultural and educational experiences shaped her background and laid the foundation for her success in the Asian entertainment industry.

[10] Her English single "Do You Want My Love" received international attention, appearing on the US Billboard Hot Dance Breakouts chart at No.

[21] After her father's death, Lee's mother moved the family to Hong Kong to seek support from relatives.

[25] Lee won the title of Miss Teen Chinatown San Francisco in 1991 at age 16, marking a significant step toward her later success in the entertainment industry.

[29] After graduating from high school in 1993,[26] she entered a TVB competition in Hong Kong[30] and was offered a recording contract.

[39] In 1994, she released her first solo albums in Mandarin in Taiwan, Love from Now On (愛就要趁現在) and Promise Me (答應我), with Fancy Pie Records.

[27] The song reached No 4 on the US Billboard Hot Dance Breakouts chart in December 1999,[49] marking her success as the first Chinese singer to break into the American market.

[51] In 2001, Lee sang the song "A Love Before Time" for the movie Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which she performed at the Oscars.

[46] The song was introduced by the actress Julia Stiles as an “evocative love ballad” that combined "the flavor and texture of Eastern music with the orchestral color and sensitive lyrics of Western culture" in the ceremony.

[citation needed] It contains the songs "Party time", "Turn" (流轉) which is on the soundtrack of the movie The Legend of Silk Boy for the Shanghai World Expo 2010 and "BYOB" ("Bring Your Own Bag") a song to encourage people to bring and recycle their own shopping bags to save the environment.

On 17 December 2011, she performed at "Booey Lehoo Concert" in Beijing with will.i.am and apl.de.ap from The Black Eyed Peas, John Legend, and Shunza.

[66][22] On 9 February 2012, she performed at the TRANS4M Boyle Heights benefit at Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles with will.i.am, apl.de.ap and Taboo from The Black Eyed Peas.

[14] In 2016, she competed in the fourth season of the Chinese reality show I Am A Singer, although she admitted that losing her voice to bronchitis in 2014 had affected her singing ability.

[70] In 2020, Coco Lee announced that she was going to re-record the Mandarin end-credits version of the song Reflection for the live adaptation of Mulan, as she had already done in 1998.

[71][72] In 2023 she was digitally animated using motion capture for the virtual reality interactive concert Millennium Realm (千禧之境) on the Pico VR video platform.

[75][76] For her wedding, she recorded the song "I Just Wanna Marry U" (Chinese and English version), which was released on 24 October 2011.

[89][90][91] On 8 March 2023, she disclosed on social media that she had surgery on her pelvis and thigh in Hong Kong the previous month, after triggering an old leg injury during a dance rehearsal in October 2022.

[103] The family asked Hong Kong authorities to investigate Lee's death, and an autopsy has been requested to determine the cause.

[104][105][106][needs update] Lee's sister Nancy has urged the government of Hong Kong to officially recognize the late star's contributions.

[107] A vigil for Lee was held on 31 July at Hong Kong Funeral Home in North Point, with a public memorial service.

[97] It was reported that towards the end of the funeral service on 31 July, Nancy suddenly became emotional when hugging a friend and was heard shouting repeatedly in Cantonese: "He took my sister away!"

[104][119] She was remembered by the New York Times as "a Chinese American singer and songwriter best known for performing an Oscar-nominated song in the hit film “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.”[120] On 17 August 2023, a nine-minute audio clip featuring Lee, a coach during the season 7 of the show Sing!

[121] Lee, who was about to undergo surgery on her left leg, alleged that she was subjected to a sudden placement change during a performance with Wang Zepeng, a contestant on her team.

There was also a leaked video of a staff member on set attempting to remove Lee from the stage as she repeatedly said, "Don't touch me.

"[122] In the nine-minute audio clip, Lee stated that the production team threatened her, saying they would not give contestant Feige a chance to return to the stage unless she wrote a Weibo post.

[124] He said in his Weibo post that "the price of 500,000 yuan per seat, in his opinion, is certainly not a baseless rumor... the top ten places in the finals are all available for purchase."

[7] On the same day (25 August), Zhejiang Satellite TV announced that the program had been frozen from broadcasting briefly pending an investigation over the alleged mistreatment of Lee and other issues raised by netizens and viewers.

Lee is remembered by millennials who grew up during a time when Mandopop boomed and enjoyed listening to her songs in English and Mandarin.

Because techniques employed by R&B singers in English would change the pitch and meaning of words in Cantonese, she taught herself Mandarin, which allows for more tonal flexibility.