He was a big fan of the manga series Hikaru no Go and actually wanted to become a Go professional, but switched his focus to shogi after finding Go too difficult to learn.
[3] He started attending a formal shogi class at local department store when he was a fourth grade elementary school student, and won the 5th All Japan Elementary School Student Kurashiki Ōshō Tournament [ja] in 2006 as a sixth-grader.
[3] He obtained full professional status and the rank of 4-dan after tying for first place in the 48th 3-dan League (October 2010 – March 2011) in 2011 with a record of 13 wins and 5 losses.
Abe defeated the computer program Shūso [ja] in the first game of the match, which turned out to be the only victory scored by the shogi professionals.
[6][7] In October 2014, Abe defeated Yūki Sasaki to 2 games to 1 to win the 45th Shinjin-Ō [ja] tournament.