These creates a completely new sounds from the 70's genre of disco which only had a small part of electronic sound in the whole song.

From its origins, the definition of the electro sound is the use of drum machines as the rhythmic base of a track; however as the style has evolved, and with the advent of computer usage in electronic music, the use of drum machines has become less and less practical and widespread. Electro drum patterns tend to be electronic emulations of breakbeats, with a syncopated kick drum, and usually a snare or clap accenting the downbeat.

The difference between electro drumbeats and breakbeats (or breaks) is that electro tends to be more mechanical, while breakbeats tend to have more of a human-like feel, like that of a live drummer. The definition however is somewhat ambiguous in nature due to the various use of the term.

Staccato, percussive drumbeats tend to dominate electro; with beats once mostly provided by the Roland TR-808 drum machine, the advent of computers in electronic music has outdated this old school method and are now used by the majority of electro producers the world over.

The TR-808, created in 1980, has an immediately recognizable sound, and through the use of samples remains somewhat popular in electro and other genres to the present day. Other electro instrumentation is generally all-electronic, favouring analog synthesis, bass lines, sequenced and atonal sound effects all created with synthesizers. Heavy use of effects such as reverbs, delays, chorus or phasers along with eerie synthetic ensemble strings or pad sounds emphasize the common science fiction or futuristic theme of the lyrics and/or music. “Light Years Away” (1982) by Warp 9, a “sci-fi tale of alien visitation” written and produced by Lotti Golden and Richard Scher, exemplifies this style of electro.

Most electro is instrumental, but a common element is vocals processed through a vocoder. Additionally, speech synthesis may be used to create robotic or mechanical lyrical content. Some earlier electro features rapping, but that lyrical style has become less popular in the genre from the 1990s onward.

The genre's immediate forebearers included Kraftwerk, Yellow Magic Orchestra (YMO), and Gary Numan.

In 1980, YMO was the first band to utilize the TR-808 programmable drum machine. 

In 1982, Bronx based producer Afrika Bambaataa released the seminal track "Planet Rock", which contained elements of Kraftwerk's "Trans-Europe Express" (from the album of the same name) and "Numbers" (from Kraftwerk's 1981 Computer World album), as well as Yellow Magic Orchestra songs such as "Riot in Lagos" (from Sakamoto's 1980 album B-2 Unit). "Planet Rock" is widely regarded as a turning point in the electro genre.

Although the early 1980s were electro's heyday in the mainstream, it enjoyed renewed popularity in the late 1990s with artists such as Anthony Rother and DJs such as Dave Clarke, and has made yet another comeback for a third wave of popularity in 2009. The continued interest in electro, though influenced to a great degree by Florida, Detroit, Miami, Los Angeles and New York styles, has primarily taken hold in Florida and Europe with electro club nights becoming commonplace again.

New branches of electro have risen over the last couple of years. Florida has pioneered the "Electrocore" sound, started in the late 90's by artists like Jackal & Hyde and Dynamix II and carried on to this day. Skweee is a genre which developed in Nordic countries such as Sweden and Finland, hence its first name "Scandinavian Funk". The outlets and artists of Skweee are still mostly limited to the Nordic countries.