It was first described in the 1920s when its reactions with benzene and p-xylene were studied by Theodor Curtius and Karl Friedrich Schmidt.

[1][2][3] The compound is reported as having "exceedingly explosive, unpredictable properties" and "in many cases very violent explosions occurred without any apparent reason".

[1] It was not until 2011 that sulfuryl diazide was isolated in a pure enough state to be fully characterized.

[4] It was characterized by infrared and Raman spectroscopy; its structure in the solid state was determined by x-ray crystallography.

[4] It was prepared by the reaction of sulfuryl chloride (SO2Cl2) with sodium azide (NaN3) using acetonitrile as solvent: Sulfuryl diazide has been used as a reagent to perform reactions that remove nitrogen from heterocyclic compounds:[5][6][7]