Born in
Muping County,
Yantai,
Shandong Province, Liu competed in track and field as a teenager and came to prominence nationally with a win at the
Chinese City Games. A win at the national junior championships in 2012 saw her rise to the top of the world
junior rankings with a personal best of . She improved again to in the final and led until the final round when Sweden's
Sofi Flinck had a large personal best to knock Liu into the silver medal position. She had won a gold medal herself at the
2012 Asian Junior Athletics Championships a month earlier. Liu made a gradual progression into the senior ranks. She was sixth at the 2012
Chinese Athletics Championships, then improved to fourth behind
Chang Chunfeng at the
12th Chinese National Games in 2013 with a personal best of – her first throw beyond sixty metres. She did not compete at a major event in 2014, but a new best throw of gave her her highest world ranking yet at 21st (behind only Asian Games winner
Zhang Li among Asian women). She established herself internationally with a win at the
2015 Asian Athletics Championships, taking the gold medal for China in a
championship record of (beating the mark set by her compatriot
Li Lingwei in 2013). On 6 August 2021, she won the gold medal in
women's javelin throw at
2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo with , thereby becoming the first Asian to win an Olympic gold medal in women's javelin throw and the second Chinese athlete to be crowned the Olympic champion in any field event. On 23 September 2021, she won the gold medal in women's javelin throw at the
2021 National Games of China in
Shaanxi with 64.33 metres. ==International competitions==