[4] Ali won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Children's Program for executive producing We Are the Dream: The Kids of the Oakland MLK Oratorical Fest (2020).

[12] He became disenchanted with the idea of a sports career because of the treatment given to the team's athletes and developed an interest in acting, particularly after taking part in a staging of Spunk, which later landed him an apprenticeship at the California Shakespeare Theater following graduation.

After a sabbatical year working for Gavin Report, he enrolled in New York University's graduate acting program at Tisch School of the Arts, earning his master's degree in 2000.

He elaborated in an interview to Vanity Fair in October 2016: "I think if you have any desire to be a leading man or to really carry some of these stories, there's this relationship that has to be cultivated with an audience.

"[13]He is known for his portrayal of Remy Danton in the Netflix series House of Cards, Cornell Stokes in Marvel's Luke Cage, Colonel Boggs in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 and Tizzy in the 2008 film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, his first major film role.

[14] In 2017, Ali joined the video game Madden NFL 18's story mode Longshot, in which he played Cutter Wade, the father of protagonist Devin.

[19] On Rotten Tomatoes, the site's critical consensus reads, "Driven by Mahershala Ali's mesmerizing performance, True Detective's third season finds fresh perspective by exploring real world events – though it loses some of the series' intriguing strangeness along the way.

[29] Ali is a devout fan of hip hop and has said within various interviews that Cambatta, Planet Asia, Skyzoo, Blu, Ka, Roc Marciano, Mach-Hommy, Pink Siifu, Fly Anakin & Mutant Academy, Mick Jenkins, Sage Elsesser, EARTHGANG, Benny The Butcher, Conway The Machine, Westside Gunn, Hus Kingpin & SmooVth are amongst his favorite artists.

Ali was nominated for the Primetime Emmy for playing Wayne Hays in the third season of the HBO crime anthology True Detective (2019).

He received nominations for the BAFTA and Golden Globe Award for Best Actor for his role in the science fiction romance Swan Song (2021).