[2] After undergraduate education in chemical engineering, Wagner studied zoology and mathematical logic at the University of Vienna, Austria.

Wagner began his academic career as assistant professor in the Theoretical Biology Department of the University of Vienna in 1985.

His research utilizes both the theoretical tools of population genetics as well as experimental approaches in evolutionary developmental biology.

[8] In August 2016, an article by Wagner and Mihaela Pavlicev, gained attention for proposing a possible evolutionary connection between the female orgasm in humans and ovulation induced by copulation in other mammals.

A test case for this approach arose when Wagner and his colleague Jacques Gauthier proposed a solution of the century-old problem of the identity of avian digits.

This view is now strongly supported by molecular and experimental evidence and shows how mechanistic insights can solve seemingly intractable conceptual problems.

Therefore, Wagner and Müller argue that the origin and maintenance of character identity is a central goal of evolutionary developmental biology.