He held world titles at four different weights - lightweight (1972-79), welterweight (1980), junior middleweight (1983-84) and middleweight (1989). He was also the only boxer to have fought in five different decades. He finally retired in January 2002 at age 52 (having previously retired in 1998) following a bad car crash in October 2001, with a professional record of 120 fights, 104 wins with 69 KOs. He was nicknamed Manos de Piedra (Hands of Stone).

Born in Guarar�, Panama he had his first professional fight in 1967. After an initial adjustment he won thirty in a row, culminating in his first title bout in June 1972, where he defeated Ken Buchanan at New York's Madison Square Garden for the WBA world lightweight championship. He then made twelve successful defences of his title before giving up the belt in February 1979. Vacating the title was a build up for an attempt at the welterweight title. He fought for the welterweight title in June 1980 and beat Sugar Ray Leonard via a 15-round unanimous decision. In the November re-match, however, Dur�n shockingly quit in the eighth round.

He took some time to recover from that fight, gaining even more weight to contend for the WBC world junior middleweight title, but losing in his first attempt at a championship in that division on the January 30 of 1982, against Wilfredo Ben�tez by a 15 round unanimous decision. After being relegated to a 10 round walk out win over Englishman Jimmy Batten at The Battle of The Champions in Miami, Dur�n signed with promoter Bob Arum. This marked the beginning of a comeback in which he beat former world champion and now hall of famer Pipino Cuevas via a fourth round knock-out, which earned him a second crack at the junior middleweight title, this time against WBA champion Davey Moore on June 16th, 1983. Duran showed his real brutal side in this flight by thuumbing Moore and trying to deliberatly hurt Moore as much as possible by butting, lacing Moore's face with his gloves and smiling everytime Moore winced in pain. Finally the fight was stopped in the eighth round as Moore was taking such a horrific beating and Duran won his third world title.

Dur�n later fought for the World middleweight title, meeting Marvin Hagler in Las Vegas in November 1983, but losing the fight over fifteen rounds. In June 1984, he was stripped of his junior middleweight title when the WBA did not approve of his fight with WBC world champion Thomas "Hitman" Hearns, and took away recognition of Duran as world champion the moment Duran stepped into the ring to box Hearns. Dur�n lost the fight after a vicious second round knock-out by Hearns.

Dur�n did not contend another title fight until 1989, but made the shot count when he won the WBC middleweight title from Iran Barkley in February. His reign was short lived once again as Duran moved up to super middleweight for third clash with Sugar Ray Leonard in December, but lost in a extremely boring decision. Duran seemed to be in decline after the fight, he attempted to win further middleweight titles in 1994, 1995 and 1996 (fighting for the minor IBC belt), and 1998 (WBA). After a quick defeat to William Joppy in the last of these shots Duran announced his retirement in August 1998, but was back fighting in 1999. In June 2000 he won a minor super middleweight title from Pat Lawlor but quickly lost it to H�ctor Camacho.

After splitting fights with Jorge Castro and losing a rematch to Camacho, Dur�n went to Argentina to promote a Salsa music CD that he had just released. While there, he was involved in a dramatic car crash and required life-saving surgery. After that, he announced his retirement from boxing.

Dur�n's five world title belts, which he won in four different divisions, were stolen from his house in Panama in 1993 during a robbery allegedly staged by his brother-in-law, who gave them to memorabilia seller Luis Gonz�lez B�ez, who will stand trial for trying to sell stolen goods. Gonz�lez B�ez allegedly sold the belts to undercover FBI agents. He alleges that Duran authorized the sale of the five belts to him during a time that Duran was facing financial trouble. On September 23, 2003, a federal judge in Florida ordered the five belts returned to Duran.

His 69 wins by knockout place him in an exclusive group of boxers who have won 50 or more fights by knockout.

Dur�n's daughter, Irichelle, is a professional woman boxer. His son, Roberto Jr., was also a professional at one time. He is also related to up and coming professional wrestler Brad Koonce.