Immediately Zoff showed some characteristics that are essential for a goalkeeper: dependability, sangfroid and the extreme confidence he was able to pass on to his team-mates. Zoff became a regular member of the Friulan team in the Serie B following season. In 1963 he moved on to AC Mantova, a Serie A club once again, and remained in Lombardy until 1967, when he joined SSC Napoli and made his debut with the national selection. Since 1972 Zoff became the undisputed regular goalkeeper of Italy for 11 years, marking one of the best periods in the history of the Azzurri team.

In 1972 Zoff joined the most important club in his professional life, i.e. Juventus FC, of which he would become the symbol. Zoff defended the Bianconeri goal until his retirement, in the 1982/83 season, without skipping a single championship match, 332 consecutive appearances in Serie A (!). With the Bianconeri he dominated national football winning the Italian title six times, and, on the international stage, the first trophy in Juventus FC history, the UEFA Cup in 1977, with a team made up only of Italian players and that would be the structure of the Italian national selection at the World Cup hosted by Argentina in the following year, one of the most appreciated and spectacular Italian national selections that played the World Cup ever (they finished fourth). The Champions League Cup, instead, remained his regret; in fact, he played two finals (in 1972 and 1973) without winning not even one.

His self-confidence, the moderation of his gestures, his impassiveness, also in the hottest stadiums, made Dino Zoff become a player of his own in the world of football. Wherever he played, he always kept the moderation that is typical of the character of a man from Friuli.

With the Azzurri shirt Zoff was one of the all-time greatest goalkeepers and still holds the invincibility record: 1,143 minutes from 20 September 1972 to 15 June 1974. Since 1968 to 1983 Zoff defended the goal of Italy 112 times in all, and, behind Paolo Maldini (126 appearances), he is the most capped player ever. He won the European championship in Italy in 1968 and the World Cup in Spain in 1982, the only Italian player that, in the postwar period, won both the world and the continental tournaments for national selections (in the 1930s Vittorio Pozzo's national squad won two World Cups and two International Cups, the equivalent of the European championship, many players won both the trophies).

Especially the World Cup won in 1982 remains the success that marked most indelibly the image of great goalkeeper Zoff. He got to play it when he was already 40, and his was an outstanding tournament. As captain he led a team over-criticized by the national press, that shut up like a clam around its most expert player, and, after a disastrous start, grew better and better till becoming unbeatable during those two weeks when they beat consecutively Argentina, that were the reigning world champions with Passarella and Maradona, super Brazil of Zico, Falcão, Eder and Junior, Poland of Lato and Zmolarek and West Germany of Rummenigge, Breitner and Stieleke in the final in Madrid. An extraordinary rush that allowed Zoff to get into the legend when he lifted the World Cup also because he was the oldest player who ever won the world tournament. The defence of the 1982 Italian national squad, made up of Zoff, Gentile, Cabrini, Scirea, Bergomi and Collovati, is still one of the strongest ones ever seen.

Zoff ended his career in the following year (1983), regretfully with a Champions League final lost 0-1 to Hamburger SV, a second position in the Serie A table and an Italy Cup won. Till September 2005 Zoff has held the Serie A appearances record, 570, outdone later by Paolo Maldini and Gianluca Pagliuca.

After his retirement, Zoff remained in the Italian Football Federation, first as the coach of the Olympic national selection and then of the Juventus FC team (a UEFA Cup and an Italy Cup won in 1990) and of the Italian national selection that he led to the Euro 2000 final.

In Italy Zoff has been a symbol of sportsmanship, skill and gentlemanliness. Never polemic, few words uttered, he has been able to make the public love him despite being what nowadays is called an "anti-star".