Pankaj Advani was born on 24 July 1985 in Pune, India. Advani spent his initial years in Kuwait before moving to Bangalore, India. He received his education at the Frank Anthony Public School, Bangalore and completed his bachelor's degree in Commerce from Sri Bhagawan Mahaveer Jain College. He received training in snooker from former national Snooker champion Arvind Savur.

Pankaj Advani, on international competitive debut in the discipline, won the IBSF World Snooker Championship (i.e. the World Amateur Snooker Championship) on 25 October 2003 in Jiangmen, China. He was 18 years old, and became the youngest Indian to win the title, his first world title. A decade later, as a 28-year-old, at the IBSF World 6-Red World Snooker Championship in Sharm-El-Sheik, Egypt, he won one of the amateur world titles (on debut in the short format).  As a new player on the tour, Advani would need to win four matches to reach the main stage of the ranking events. He did this in just his fourth attempt, when qualifying for the International Championship. He defeated Craig Steadman 6-1, six-time world champion Steve Davis 6-5 (after being 1-4 down), Alan McManus 6-3 and Michael Holt 6-4 to reach the venue stage for the first time. He made four century breaks during qualification, the most of any player. Advani was to play a wildcard match once at the tournament in Chengdu, China, to reach the last 32, however he decided to withdraw from the tournament to take part in the World Billiards Championship, which he went on to win. He also reached the semi-finals of the minor ranking European Tour Event 1, beating four-time world champion John Higgins 4-1 along the way. Advani lost to Mark Selby 2-4. Advani played in eight of the ten of these Players Tour Championship events and finished 40th on the Order of Merit.  At the 2013 Welsh Open, he became the first Indian player to reach the quarter-final stage of a ranking event with a 4-1 win over Graeme Dott in the last 16, but lost 2-5 to Judd Trump. Advani's season ended when he was beaten 8-10 by Joe Swail in the first round of World Championship Qualifying. He was ranked world number 74 after his first year on the main snooker tour.

What made him decide to branch out into snooker?