Kuiper went to college at the University of Leiden. He graduated in 1927 and went on to earn his doctorate in 1933. That same year, he moved to the United States and began working at the Lick Observatory in California. In 1935, he was a lecturer at Harvard University. In 1936, he moved to the University of Chicago, and in 1943 he became a professor there. He was the director of their observatories from 1947 until 1960. In 1960, Kuiper began work at the University of Arizona, and he started their lunar and planetary laboratory. He was the director of the laboratory until July 1973.