Wirth was born on February 15, 1934, in Switzerland, He is famous for creating several programming languages, including ALGOL W, Pascal, and Modula-2, that shaped modern computer software.

Wirth's work stressed simplicity, clarity, and efficiency in programming languages, which had a huge impact on later language design and the development of structured programming methods. For those who trained on it, it will be remembered for having an obsession with the semi-colon. 

He also created the Oberon programming language and the Oberon operating system. Wirth's passion for elegant and efficient software design still inspires computer scientists and software engineers around the world, making him a respected figure in the history of computing.

After leaving Berkeley, Wirth held a professorship in the newly created computer science department at Stanford University (1963–67) before returning to Switzerland.

Following a short stay at the University of Zürich, in 1968 Wirth accepted a professorship in informatics at ETH, where he tried for years to establish an independent computer science department before succeeding in 1981. Except for a two-year sabbatical at Xerox PARC (1976–77), a research facility in California, Wirth remained at ETH until his retirement in 1999.

In 1984, he won the Turing Award for his developement of a sequence of innovative computer languages.