Yang earned her Woman Grandmaster (WGM) title in 2007. In 2011 and 2013, she won the national Chinese Women's Chess Championship. In 2015, after scoring second place at the Asian Continental Women's Championship, Yang won the right to participate in the Women's World Chess Championship 2016.
Regarding team events, she played on the Chinese team that won the women's event of the Asian Nations Cup in 2012 and represented China in the Women's Chess Olympiad 2016. She has also competed in the Chinese Chess League since 2006, playing for the Hebei chess club, the Shandong chess club, and the Shanghai Mobile China chess club.
She studied health-related sciences at the University of Macau and has a Master's degree in Sports Science from Beijing Sports University.