Ryan Taylor arrived on loan from Rotherham United in  2010 and played seven games in a late-season stint at St James’ Park. He later played for Bristol City, Portsmouth and Oxford before spending three years with Plymouth Argyle.

Ryan progressed through the Rotherham United system and made his senior debut in December 2005 but did not feature again until August 2006. Following a loan to Burton Albion, he scored his first senior goal for Rotherham in November 2007 and finished the 2007/08 campaign with six goals. Then, after featuring regularly during 2009/10 and with his club still in the promotion hunt, Ryan made a surprise late move to Exeter City just as the loan transfer window was closing in March 2010.

Stepping up a division, Ryan played the first of his seven league matches for the Grecians in a goalless draw at Brentford. But he failed to score in any of his appearances for Exeter, the last of which was against Huddersfield on 8 May. Ryan then returned to Rotherham and started in all three games of the Millers’ ultimately unsuccessful play-off campaign.   

Scoring a dozen times in 2010-11, and after making a total of 137 league and play-off appearances (59 as substitute) scoring 23 goals, Ryan switched to Bristol City in June 2011. After a relatively unproductive spell at Ashton Gate, he was to move to Portsmouth in January 2014 for whom he netted fifteen league goals during an eighteen-month stay.  Ryan then agreed a deal with Oxford United, where he was less successful, ahead of moving to Plymouth Argyle in a deadline-day deal at the end of January 2017.

Ryan remained at Argyle until the end of the COVID-19 affected 2019–20 season playing around ninety league games, often coming off the bench, and scoring eleven league goals. He was then at Newport County for the 2020/21 season, appearing as a substitute in his team’s League Two play-off final defeat to Morecambe, prior to joining Grimsby Town in June 2021. This time around Ryan played in a winning play-off final side as the Mariners defeated Solihull Moors to return to the Football League. This led to his contract being extended into 2022/23 and, in March 2023, Ryan came on as substitute when Grimsby won 2-1 at Southampton in the 5th round of the FA Cup. He was subsequently released at the end of the campaign and signed for Alfreton Town in June 2023.