He has also appeared in two other ranking tournament finals: the 1997 Welsh Open, where he lost 2–9 to Stephen Hendry;[2] and the 2004 Irish Masters,[3] where Peter Ebdon defeated him 10–7.

In December 2004, King beat Robin Hull, Mark Williams, Alan McManus and John Parrott en route to the semi-finals of the UK Championship, losing 9–4 to eventual winner Stephen Maguire.

He then won his second match 5–3 against Chinese player Tian Pengfei to reach his first Quarter final since the 2007 Malta Cup.

[19] He required a final frame decider to beat Liu Song in qualifying 5–4 and once in China he won by the same scoreline to knock out defending champion Ali Carter in the first round.

[26] King saw off Mark Williams 6–3 in the first round of the 2012 UK Championship, before surrendering a 3–0 lead against 17-year-old Luca Brecel to lose 4–6.

[27] He also reached the second round of the German Masters by whitewashing Stephen Maguire 5–0, but then lost in a deciding frame to Matthew Stevens.

[30] King had his best results in the Chinese ranking events during the 2013–14 season, beginning with the Wuxi Classic where he beat Rory McLeod 5–3 and Marco Fu 5–4, before being thrashed 5–0 by Neil Robertson in the last 16.

[31] At the Shanghai Masters he knocked out Graeme Dott, but Robertson was again victorious when the pair met in the last 16 this time winning 5–3.

[32] During King's tie with Fergal O'Brien in the last 64 of the 2013 UK Championship, he made 15 consecutive foul and misses in the sixth frame and went on to lose 6–3.

[32] The match was played in a sports hall as the Barbican Centre itself was too small to accommodate enough tables, with King saying afterwards that the conditions were not good enough and as long as the top players were okay the governing body did not care.

[34] King failed to reach The Crucible this year as Jamie Cope beat him 10–7 in the final round of World Championship qualifiers.

[36] He defeated Steven Hallworth and Michael White both 5–3 to qualify for the German Masters and eliminated world number five Barry Hawkins 5–3 in the first round.

[38] A consistent season in the European Tour events saw King finish 24th on the Order of Merit to make his debut in the Grand Final.

[43] King overcame Ali Carter 5–2 at the China Open and beat Murphy 5–3 and Martin O'Donnell 5–0 to reach his first ranking event quarter-final in two years.

At the inaugural Northern Ireland Open, King beat Igor Figueiredo, Liang Wenbo, Fergal O'Brien, Kurt Maflin, Hossein Vafaei Ayouri and Kyren Wilson to reach his first ranking event final since 2004.

[50][51] King saw off Stephen Maguire and Ali Carter both 4–3 to progress to the quarter-finals of the World Grand Prix, where he lost 4–2 to Marco Fu.

[52] For the fourth year in a row King could not play in the World Championship as he was beaten 10–4 by Xiao Guodong in the final qualifying round.

[53] On 15 November 2024, it was announced that King had been banned from snooker for five years and ordered to pay £68,299.50 in costs after an Independent Disciplinary Committee found him guilty of one count of match fixing and one count of providing inside information relating to a match he played against Joe Perry at the Welsh Open on 13 February 2023.