Gizem Emre was born on May 22, 1995 in Berlin-Kreuzberg to Kurdish parents from Turkey. She discovered her passion and talent for acting while still a student in her school's drama group. After successfully applying to a talent agency at the age of 17, she began playing small roles in front of the camera. In 2013, she was part of the ensemble cast of the hit movie "Fack ju Göhte" ("Suck Me Shakespeer"). While her role as student Zeynep was relatively small in this film, she became more central to the stories in the sequels "Fack ju Göhte 2" ("Suck Me Shakepseer 2", 2015) and "Fack ju Göhte 3" ("Suck Me Shakespeer 3", 2017).

In 2014, Emre became a regular in the television series "Alarm for Cobra 11 - The Autobahn Police" in the leading role as Commissioner Dana Gerkhan. She appeared in over 50 episodes until her departure in 2022. In addition, Gizem Emre made guest appearances in several other series (such as "SOKO München", "Letzte Spur Berlin", "Biohackers" and "Wild Republic") and in various television movies, including as a Muslim high school student in Buket Alakuş's drama "Die Neue" (2015), as a drug-addicted Moroccan woman in Cüneyt Kaya's social drama "Dimitrios Schulze" (2016) and as the love interest of a young Amish man in Berlin in the Netflix comedy "Rumspringa" (2022).

Emre starred alongside Jella Haase in the "Fack ju Göhte" spin-off "Chantal im Märchenland" (2024), in which her character Zeynep finds herself in a bizarre fairy tale world with her best friend Chantal.