Götz Schubert was born in Pirna in 1963. Between 1984 and 1987, he studied at the Ernst Busch acting school in Berlin, followed by remarkable engagements at the Maxim Gorki Theater (1987-1993) and the Deutsche Theater (1993-2001). During that time, Schubert twice won the critics award of the "Berliner Zeitung" (1988 and 1990), and also was named new talent of the year in 1990. He got rave reviews  for his performance as Adolf Hitler in the  now-legendary staging of George Tabori's "Mein Kampf (1990) at the Gorki Theater.

Since the mid-1980s, Schubert has also been working for film and television. He played his first leading screen role in the comedy "Zwei schräge Vögel", one of the last DEFA productions before the fall of the wall.
From the 1990s on, he appeared in numerous TV series and primetime dramas. Later, he gained much popularity as a cast member of the critically acclaimed crime series "KDD – Kriminaldauerdienst" (2007), for which he and his co-stars won both the German Televison Award and the Grimme Award.
Among his movie roles are an industrious East-German caretaker in Peter Timm's comedy "Der Zimmerspringbrunnen" (2001), a doctor in the tragicomedy "Eierdiebe" (2003) and a Nazi officer in Dennis Gansel's "Napola" (2004).

Following  memorable turns in Ulla Wagner's post-war drama "Die Entdeckung der Currywurst" (2008) and Lars Kraume's dystopic Sci-Fi film "Die kommenden Tage" (2010), he starred in Pia Strietmann's "Tage, die bleiben" (2011), playing a father who becomes embroiled in a bitter confrontation with  his almost grown-up children  following the accidental death of the wife and mother of the family.