Tech house, like progressive house, represents a fusion of house and either techno or minimal. However, whereas progressive house tends to incorporate atmospheric, ethereal, almost ambient sounds and is often mixed to varying degrees with trance and progressive trance, tech-house tends to have more in common with soulful deep house, traditional Detroit-style techno, and contemporary minimal, with which it is often mixed in practice.

As a musical (as opposed to a mixing) style, tech-house uses the same basic structure as house. However, elements of the house 'sound' such as realistic jazz sounds (in deep house) and booming kick drums are replaced with elements from techno such as shorter, deeper, darker and often distorted kicks, smaller, quicker hi-hats, noisier snares and more synthetic or acid sounding synth melodies from the TB-303, including raw electronic noises from distorted sawtooth and square wave oscillators.

As one reviewer for Amazon.com suggested, this style fuses "steady techno rhythms with the soul and accessibility of house."