Ben Mertens is from
Wetteren. When he was 12 years old, he reached the 2nd round of the 2017
EBSA European Under-18 Snooker Championship. At the 2018 event he got to the quarter-finals, where he lost to the later champion
Jackson Page. He won the Belgian U18 championship in 2018. In August 2018 he played in a professional ranking tournament for the first time, and beat
Adam Stefanow in the first round of the
2018 Paul Hunter Classic. In January 2019, he defeated
Michael White, then ranked #36 in the world, at a snooker tournament in
Bruges. At the
2019 Snooker Shoot-Out, a
ranking tournament for which he got a wild card, he beat
James Wattana in the first round. In March 2020 he lost in the semi-finals of the
EBSA European Under-21 Snooker Championships to later champion
Aaron Hill. In July 2020 he defeated
James Cahill in the first round of the World Championship qualifiers, becoming the youngest player ever to win a match in the World Championships. This record was broken by
Liam Davies, who was two days younger than Mertens when he won his first match at the
2022 World Snooker Championship qualifiers. In June 2022 turned professional after winning the
EBSA European Under-21 Snooker Championships and gained a two-year tour card for the
2022–23 and
2023–24 snooker seasons. == Performance and rankings timeline ==