At the 2016 Riga Masters, Astley beat Joe Perry 4–1, Andy Hicks 4–2 and Jimmy Robertson 4–1 to play in the quarter-finals of a ranking event for the first time in his career, where he lost 4–1 to Mark Williams.&lt;ref name="2016/17"&gt;&lt;/ref&gt; He also reached the third round of the Indian Open and Paul Hunter Classic and was defeated 4–2 by Nigel Bond and 4–1 by Zack Richardson. Astley qualified for the International Championship by overcoming Peter Ebdon 6–3 and then saw off Mark King 6–4 once in China, before losing 6–2 to Mark Selby. He recovered to win 5–4 from 4–0 down against Kyren Wilson to qualify for the German Masters, where he was edged out 5–4 by Ricky Walden in the opening round. Astley progressed through to the fourth round of the Gibraltar Open by 4–1 victories over Andreas Ploner, George Pragnall and Ben Woollaston and was eliminated 4–2 by Ryan Day. He finished his first year back on the tour ranked world number 76.