Danov was born in Klisura, a town in Ottoman Rumelia (today in central Bulgaria), to the family of a frieze waver.

Danov's work as a publisher began in Belgrade, the capital of the Principality of Serbia, where he printed the calendar Balkan Mountain Boy.

Together with the teacher Yacho (Yoakim) Truvchev and the bookbinder Nyagul Boyadzhiyski, he founded the bindery Druzhestvena knigoveznitsa (Дружествена книговезница) in 1857 in Plovdiv.

[4] By 1862, the company had evolved into the Hristo G. Danov & Co. Publishing House, and Yoakim Gruev had joined as a partner.

Other books published by Danov included individual works by Euripides, Ivan Turgenev, Guy de Maupassant and Jules Verne.

[3] In 1876, in the wake of the major anti-Ottoman April Uprising organized by the Bulgarian population, Danov was imprisoned for three months in Plovdiv.

[3] Danov began his political career as a member of the Eastern Rumelia Regional Assembly in 1882.