Lilith Stangenberg was born in Berlin on August 14 1988. Already at a young age, she appeared in prodcutions of the youth theatre "P14", which later garnered the self-taught actress engagements at the Schauspiel Hannover (2008/2009) and the Schauspielhaus Zurich (2009-2012). In 2010, the trade paper "Theater heute" named her newcomer of the year. From 2012 to 2016, Stangenberg was a member of the ensemble of the Volksbühne Berlin, where she worked with Frank Castorf, Ulli Lommel and René Pollesch, among others.

Following several appearances in short films, Lilith Stangenberg guest-starred as an Ukrainian prostitute in an episode of the TV series "Rosa Roth". She went on to play supporting roles in the TV productions "Das blaue Licht" (2010) and "Polizeiruf 110: Stillschweigen" (2012; Regie Eoin Moore).

After a memorable turn in Vanessa Jopp's tragicomedy "Lügen und andere Wahrheiten" (2014), Stangenberg was the female lead in Christoph Hochhäusler's political thriller "Die Lügen der Sieger" ("The Lies of the Victors", 2014). She then appeared in Lars Kraume's "Der Staat gegen Fritz Bauer" ("The People vs. Fritz Bauer", 2015) and Uli Lommel's "Mondo Americana" (US 2015) before starring in "Wild", the third feature film by Nicolette Krebitz. "Wild" premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2016. Her powerhouse performance in the film won Stangenberg the Preis der deutschen FIlmkritik (Prize of the German Film Critics' Association) as well as the Günter-Rohrbach-Filmpreis.

Lighter fare was the Bavarian crime comedy film "Grießnockerlaffäre" ("The Dumpling Affair", 2017), in which Stangenberg played a small role as a Russian femme fatale. She appeared in several bigger guest roles in TV series such as "Bella Block" and "Tatort", before she starred on the big screen again in "Whatever Happens Next" (2018), playing an eccentric, who starts a relationship with a forty-something year old nonconformist.

In 2019, she was part of the ensemble of Angela Schanelec's award-winning "Ich war zuhause, aber..." ("I Was At Home, But..."), followed by the leading role of a intellectually disabled woman in the sibling drama "Idioten der Familie" ("Family Idiots"). 

In January 2020, Lilith Stangenberg was awarded the Ulrich Wildgruber Prize for the promotion of young actors. In his laudatory speech, filmmaker Alexander Kluge emphasized Stangenberg's "courage to experience artistic boundaries and the unconditionality in her work." The two had made the experimental feature film "Orphea" together, which premiered at the Berlinale 2020. In the free interpretation of the Orpheus myth, Stangenberg played the title role. Due to the Corona pandemic, the film was not released theatrically until summer 2021.

Three films starring Stangenberg were released in 2022: In the Marxist vampire comedy "Blutsauger" ("Bloodsuckers") by Julian Radlmaier, she played Octavia, a factory owner who is as mysterious as she is seductive; in the atmospheric episodic film "Die stillen Trabanten", she played the Muslim convert Aisha, with whom burger roaster Jens (Albrecht Schuch) falls in love; For the experimental film "Love Is A Dog From Hell", Stangenberg again worked with director and video artist Khavn De La Cruz, who had already directed "Orphea" - then together with Alexander Kluge.

The following year, "Seneca" (2023) was released in German cinemas, with Stangenberg co-starring with John Malkovich.