In 1994, ESN Zurich was founded as the first branch of ESN in Switzerland with two equivalent sections (ETH Zurich and University of Zurich). For a long time these two sections were the only ones in Switzerland.

In 2000, students at the University of Lausanne and at the University of Applied Sciences in Winterthur decided to each also create an ESN section for the exchange students at their Higher Education Institutes.

More and more ESN sections were founded and the following year and on 24th of August 2001, the National Platform ESN Switzerland was founded in Zurich. This increased the contact and the cooperation between the sections. What followed was a rise in the quality of the services offered on the local, national and international level.

In 2003, ESN Switzerland managed to establish important contacts with other student organisations such as VSS-UNES and became widely recognised.

To this day, ESN Switzerland counts 14 sections in Basel, Berne, Chur, Fribourg, Geneva, Lausanne EPFL, Lausanne UNIL, Luzern, Lugano, Neuchâtel, Olten, St. Gallen, Winterthur, Zurich