Birol Ünel was born on August 18, 1961, in Silifke, Turkey. He came to Germany in 1968. After an apprenticeship as a parquet layer he attended actor's training at Schauspielschule Hannover. He then went started to perform on stage. He played Caligula in the eponymous play which he also directed at the Tacheles in Berlin and was Siegfried in Castorf's 1994 production of "Die Nibelungen – Born Bad" at Berlin's Volksbühne.

In 1987, Ünel made his movie debut in "Der Passagier" ("The Passenger - Welcome to Germany") which was followed by several minor parts mainly in the role of shady characters. He then gained attention with his portrayal of a plainclothes policeman in "Dealer" (1998), yet his big breakthrough came with his role in Fatih Akin's multi-award-winning drama "Gegen die Wand" ("Head-On", 2004). His impersonation of an alcoholic who enters into a fictitious marriage with a young Turkish woman, with whom he falls in love unexpectedly, earned him a German Film Award as Best Leading Actor. After "Gegen die Wand", Ünel also played in Turkish films such as "Hirsiz var" (2005) as well as in international productions such as "Not a Lovestory" (2005).

In Germany he played some important supporting roles, such as in "Valerie" (2006) and in "Haus der schlafenden Schönen" ("House of Sleeping Beauties", 2006). He then took another leading role in "Die Unerzogenen" (2007), the award-winning cinema debut of director Pia Marais. In Bernd Böhlich's "Der Mond und andere Liebhaber" (2008) he played the married lover of the main character, Katharina Thalbach.

In 2008, Ünel was cast once more by Fatih Akin: Alongside Moritz Bleibtreu and Adam Bousdoukos, he played a both talented and aggressive chef in "Soul Kitchen". The film received several awards, including the Special Jury Prize at the 2009 Venice International Film Festival, and ran very successfully in German cinemas.

In the following decade, Ünel was merely seen in minor roles in international and German film productions, e.g. in Ana Rodríguez Rosell's "Buscando a Eimish" (ES 2012) and "Falling" (DO/ES 2016) or in "Ich bin dann mal weg" ("I'm Off Then: Losing and Finding Myself on the Camino de Santiago" 2015), the successful film adaptation of Hape Kerkeling's bestseller about his experience on the Camino de Santiago.

On September 3, 2020 Birol Ünel died of cancer at the age of 59.