His first major professional successes came in 2005 when he won the China Open and the UK Championship, becoming the first player from outside Great Britain and Ireland to win the title.

[4] The family moved to Dongguan, Guangdong, and Ding left formal education at age 11 to practice snooker for eight hours each day.

[5] He was unable to progress much in 2003 when both Asian tournaments were canceled because of the 2002–03 SARS virus outbreak, but he reached the semi-finals of the IBSF World Under-21 Championship, and the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA) awarded him a concession to play on the main snooker tour, which enabled him to turn professional in September 2003.

[8] In April 2005, Ding celebrated his 18th birthday by reaching the final of the China Open in Beijing, defeating world top 16 ranked players Peter Ebdon, Marco Fu, and Ken Doherty.

[9] In December 2005, Ding beat Jimmy White, Paul Hunter, and Joe Perry to reach the final of the UK Championship.

[14][15] In December 2006, Ding won three gold medals at the 2006 Asian Games, winning the single, double, and team snooker competitions.

[16] The following week, he reached the quarter-finals of the 2006 UK Championship as the defending champion, but lost 5–9 to his practice partner and eventual winner Peter Ebdon.

[12] In January 2007, Ding defeated Cao Xinlong 5–4 to reach the final of the Chinese National Championship in his home town of Yixing, Jiangsu.

This, along with the boisterous and hostile nature of the London crowd, led Ding to leave the table in tears during the twelfth frame when he was trailing 3–8 in the best-of-19-frames contest.

[20][21][22] Ding was defeated in the first round of the next two consecutive tournaments, losing 2–5 to Stephen Maguire in the 2007 Malta Cup[23] and 1–5 to Jamie Cope in the Welsh Open.

[12] At the 2008 World Snooker Championship, Ding reached the second round for the first time, beating Marco Fu 10–9 before losing 7–13 to Stephen Hendry.

[27] Ding started the 2008–09 season on a high, winning the Jiangsu Classic after beating Ryan Day 4–0 in the semi-final and Mark Selby 6–5 in the final.

[32] At the 2009 UK Championship, Ding reached the final after defeating Mike Dunn 9–5, Shaun Murphy 9–3, Ali Carter 9–8, and Stephen Maguire 9–5.

[38] Ding reached the second round of the Shanghai Masters and the quarter-finals of the World Open, where he lost 1–5 to Jamie Cope and 2–3 to Mark Williams.

[64] He beat Kurt Maflin 4–0 in the semi-finals; in the final, he recovered from 0–3 against Neil Robertson to take his sixth ranking title with a 4–3 win.

At the minor-ranking Bluebell Wood Open, he made a rare 146 break while beating Jimmy Robertson in the quarter-finals before losing 3–4 to Marco Fu in the semi-finals.

[72] Following that, Ding played in the first Indian Open, defeating Aditya Mehta 5–0 in the final to become the first player to win back-to-back major-ranking event titles in the same season since Ronnie O'Sullivan in 2003.

[73] Ding continued dominating the game in the following major ranking event, the International Championship, where he beat Graeme Dott 9–7 in the semi-finals with a 63-point clearance in the last frame.

[87] Ding's poor form continued into 2015 as he was eliminated in the first round in six successive events: 3–6 to Joe Perry at the Masters; 4–5 to Ryan Day at the German Masters; 1–4 to world number 115 Lee Walker at the Welsh Open; 3–4 to Thepchaiya Un-Nooh at the Indian Open; 1–4 to Ricky Walden at the World Grand Prix; and 1–4 to Joe Perry at the 2015 Players Championship Grand Final.

[90] In Ding's second ranking-event semi-final of the season, he tied the scores at 5–5 after being 3–5 down to world number 56 Gary Wilson but lost the deciding frame.

[99] At the World Grand Prix, Ding beat Ben Woollaston 4–3, Peter Ebdon 4–0, and Thepchaiya Un-Nooh 4–3 to reach his first semi-final of the season against Shaun Murphy, which he lost 3–6.

[98] In the quarter-finals of the PTC Finals, Ding was defeated 4–2 by Barry Hawkins and he lost 1–5 to Lee Walker in the China Open qualifying.

[101] He defeated Mark Williams 13–3 in the quarter-finals and Alan McManus 17–11 in the semi-final, during which he set a new record of seven century breaks, the most scored by a single player in a World Championship match at the Crucible Theatre.

[106] Ding defeated John Higgins 6–2 and Judd Trump 9–4 to reach the final of the International Championship, where he made a high break of 47 but Mark Selby won the last seven frames to beat him 10–1.

[12] At the 2017 World Cup, Ding and China's number-two player, Liang Wenbo, defeated the English pair, Judd Trump and Barry Hawkins, in a deciding frame, winning the event 4–3.

[121] In 2018, Ding returned to form and reached the final of the World Grand Prix, where he won a 6–5 victory over Mark Selby in the semi-final.

[129] They beat Andy Lee and Cheung Ka Wai 4–0 in the quarter-finals, before losing 1–4 in the semi-finals to eventual winners John Higgins and Stephen Maguire.

[138] By late 2021, he had won just one ranking event in the previous four years, had missed many tournaments through choice or circumstance, and had struggled to practice while spending long stretches of time in China during the COVID-19 pandemic.

[145][146] Before the 2022 UK Championship, Ding had fallen to 38th in the world rankings and had to win two qualifying matches to reach the tournament's main stage.

[161] A 26-episode cartoon series, Dragon Ball No.1, by Beijing-based D5 Studio, which is based on Ding's growth from a shy boy to a snooker star, was broadcast on Chinese television in 2010.