Tech house was born where techno met deep house in mid-90s England, and it has never really left the clubs since. Having spent years making Serum tech house presets, I want to walk through where the genre started, what genuinely defines its sound, and how I’d program these patches in Serum 2 today.
One thing has changed since this post first went up: Serum is now Serum 2. It arrived in March 2025 as a free upgrade for Serum 1 owners, and the synth grew considerably: three oscillators where there were two, five engines including granular and spectral, new FX buses and a built-in sequencer. Every preset named below runs in it. And if all you want right now is sounds, our free Serum 2 presets pack has 250+ patches, tech house basses among them, no strings attached.
A quick history of tech house
The style traces back to DJs like Mr. C, Eddie Richards and Terry Francis, who around 1994 were spinning this techno-house hybrid in English clubs. It had neither techno’s cold hammer nor house’s warm shuffle; it lived precisely in between.
The first big wave stretched from roughly 1995 to 2005. Plastic City as a label carried a lot of that era, above all Jean F. Cochois (The Timewriter) and Norman Feller (Terry Lee Brown Jr.). Steve Lawler put out the Dark Drums compilation in 1997, and it grew into a cult record among dance music fans. Wamdue Project, Luomo and plenty of others contributed their own classics in the same window.
Then came the second life, honestly a larger one. FISHER’s “Losing It” was everywhere in 2018, and by the 2020s tech house had reached festival main stages on the backs of artists like Chris Lake, John Summit and Dom Dolla. In 2026 it remains one of the most streamed and most produced club genres. Names who shaped the sound over the years: Eric Prydz, Steve Angello, FISHER, Chris Lake, Benny Benassi, Terry Lee Brown Jr, Eddie Richards, Terry Francis.
Tech house vs deep house: the real difference
People mix up tech house and deep house all the time, yet on a dancefloor they behave nothing alike. Tech house runs faster, drier and rides the bassline. Deep house takes it slower and warmer, leaning into chords and atmosphere.
- Tech house: 126–130 BPM, sparse arrangement, one dominant bassline, punchy drums, short vocal chops.
- Deep house: 120–125 BPM, lush chords, longer pads, softer drum tone.
Hear the split for yourself. First up, a tech house drum loop at 128 BPM:
Monosounds — Tech House Drum Loop
Then a deep house loop at 122 BPM — hear how much rounder and lazier it moves:
Monosounds — Deep House Drum Loop
The synths that built the sound
The classic tech house records came off hardware: Nord Lead, Yamaha AN1x, Roland JP-8000, Access Virus, Korg Prophecy, Korg MS2000, Korg Microkorg, Novation Supernova, Alesis Micron, Waldorf Blofeld, Studiologic Sledge.
Of that whole list, the Roland JP-8000 probably saw the most use. Two-timbral, 49 keys, 8-note polyphony, 128 single programs plus 64 combinations in preset memory, a pitch joystick and a programmable ribbon controller. History remembers it as the supersaw synth, but in tech house its job was mostly tight basses and stabby leads.
In our studio we rebuilt the style’s most iconic sounds. Have a listen:
Huge Brass Tech House Lead Sounds
Punchy Tech House Bass Sounds
Analog Drum Machines Tech House Drums
TB-303 Type Tech House Bass
Virus Acid Type Tech House Lead
Good news: none of that hardware is required anymore. Serum 2 handles all of it, and in a mix it usually comes out cleaner.
How I’d build a tech house bass in Serum 2
Rather program the classic “rubber” tech house bass yourself than load a preset? This is the recipe I keep coming back to:
- A single oscillator running a basic saw or square wavetable, pulled down into the F1–G1 range. Mono with legato on, portamento at 30–50 ms so you get those slides.
- Low-pass filter (the MG Low 12 model is great here), cutoff sitting around 400–800 Hz, resonance near 15–25%. Send an envelope to cutoff, zero attack, decay of 150–250 ms; that’s where the “boing” comes from.
- Add a clean sine sub on a second oscillator, one octave lower, unfiltered. Serum 2 leaves you a third oscillator spare, and I sometimes stack a slightly detuned square up top for grit.
- Send the sub and the main layer to separate FX buses — new in Serum 2. Distortion and OTT touch only the mid layer, while the sub stays bone dry. That’s the trick behind a bass that slams on a club rig yet still reads on a phone speaker.
- Sidechain the lot to the kick. Tech house treats the pump as part of the groove, not as a mixing chore.
The full step-by-step with screenshots lives in our tech house bass in Serum 2 tutorial. If the synth itself is new territory, read Serum 2 for beginners first; the bass recipe lands much better afterwards.
One more Serum 2 feature worth your time: the built-in sequencer. A 16-step bassline can live inside the patch itself, per-step pitch and velocity included, so groove ideas get auditioned without ever opening the piano roll. For rolling tech house basslines that saves serious time.
Serum 2 tech house presets we make
Want to skip the sound design and go straight to writing? These are our tech house packs: the same patches that power our own demos.
FISHLAKE Vol.1 — Tech House Serum 2 Presets & Sample Pack: basses, leads and drum loops centered on that classic UK tech house tone.
Fishlake Vol.2 — Tech House Serum 2 Presets: the genre bestseller in our shop. More modern, heavier on the low end, closer to the FISHER / John Summit school of bass.
Techsonic — Tech-House Presets for Xfer Serum 2: the darker, more percussive corner of the genre. Solid starting points when your references lean minimal.
Taste drifting toward the techno end of the spectrum? Technocraft covers that territory — harder basses and colder leads that still slot comfortably into a tech house set.
FAQ: Serum tech house presets
Do pro tech house producers actually use presets?
Yes, all the time. The typical working producer starts from a preset and reshapes the filter, envelope and FX to suit the track. The real skill lives in groove and arrangement, not in programming every patch from init. Presets double as a school, too: open one, watch what the macros do, take the technique home.
Do Serum 1 presets work in Serum 2?
Yes. Serum 2 opens every Serum 1 preset, and Serum 1 owners get the upgrade free. Old patches load with all the new engine features sitting on top. Unsure what actually changed? Our Serum 1 vs Serum 2 comparison lays it out. Installing packs takes two minutes as well; see how to install Serum 2 presets.
What BPM is tech house?
126–130 BPM, and 128 is the sweet spot. Deep house sits slightly lower at 120–125, which explains a lot of why the two genres feel so different even when the sounds overlap.
What’s the best synth for tech house in 2026?
My pick is Serum 2, and not only because presets for it are what I sell. A single synth now covers wavetable, granular, spectral, sample and multisample work, the FX buses solve the old bass-splitting workflow outright, and no other softsynth comes close to its preset ecosystem.
Tech house remains one of the most alive genres in the underground, and the tools have never been better. For a free starting point, download our 250+ free Serum 2 presets and hear how the basses sit in your next groove.
Stay inspired,
Max from Monosounds.studio
I run Monosounds.studio and make the packs myself. Ten-plus years of producing, 97+ releases, 16,000+ downloads. Every Serum 2 preset we ship passes a CPU check on a mid-range laptop and gets used in a real track before release. If it does not survive a mix, it does not go in the pack.
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