Yan began to feature in professional competitions at the start of the 2013–14 season, aged 13, in Asian Players Tour Championship events, and as a wildcard player in Chinese ranking tournaments. His first win against a professional came in his first match, against Vinnie Calabrese in the 2013 Yixing Open. He also secured wins over Stuart Bingham, Yu Delu, Barry Pinches and Liang Wenbo during the 2013–14 and 2014–15 seasons. He reached the last 32 of the 2014 Wuxi Classic and 2014 Shanghai Masters.