[5] Born in Souk Ahras, Makhloufi made his international debut at the 2007 IAAF World Cross Country Championships, where he finished 82nd in the 8 km junior race.

Makhloufi slowed and dropped out in the early stages of his 800 m – a performance that led to him being disqualified from the Games as the IAAF referee "considered that he had not provided a bona fide effort".

[26] On 15 August 2016, he set a new personal best and Algerian record in the 800m final at the Olympic Games in Rio with a time of 1:42:61 finishing second behind David Rudisha from Kenya.

[27] Only 8 hours later, he started the qualifying rounds of the 1500 m reaching the final where he finished second behind Matthew Centrowitz in a slow tactical race [28] winning his second silver in the 2016 Summer Olympics and his third Olympian medal.

[30] In 2019, Makhloufi was awarded the Medal of Order of Merit by the Algerian government as a compensation of his outstanding sport career representing Algeria in international competitions.

[31] In March 2020, Makhloufi travelled to South Africa to prepare for the planned 2020 Summer Olympics on high altitude, but was trapped by the pandemic and was unable to regain Algeria until late July 2020.

He dismissed his training camp planned in Mexico on January 10, 2021 [33] due to an injury that he was treating in Algeria and continued his preparations for the 2020 Summer Olympics where he qualified for the 1500 m event after achieving the qualification standard in the 2019 World Athletics Championships.

[34] Though he had not raced since October 2019, Makhloufi was entered to run in the 1500 metres event at the 2020 Summer Olympics; however before the start of competition he withdrew due to a knee injury.