Nazeeruddin received a PhD in chemistry from the Osmania University in Hyderabad, Indiaserved as a lecturer at Osmania University for two years. He then joined the Central Salt and Marine Chemicals Research Institute in Bhavnagar, India. In 1987 he joined EPFL first as a postdoctoral fellow and then held several positions as research fellow for seven years. In 2012, he was promoted to "Maître d’ Enseignement et de Recherche" (senior lecturer). Since 2014 he has served as full professor at EPFL (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne) and head of the Laboratory for Molecular Engineering of Functional Materials at School of Basic Sciences based at EPFL's Valais campus.
He has also had several affiliated and voluntary positions while working and employed at EPFL, such as World Class University Professor (2009–2014) and as BKPLUS 21 (2014–2019) at the Department of Advanced Materials, Chemistry of the Korea University, and as Visiting Professor at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia (2014–2021) and at the North China Electric Power University (2014–2021), and as an eminent professor at Brunei.