Hardcore (also known as hardcore techno) is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany in the early 1990s. It is distinguished by faster tempos (160 to 200 BPM or more) and a distorted sawtooth kick, the intensity of the kicks and the synthesized bass (in some subgenres), the rhythm and the atmosphere of the themes (sometimes violent), the usage of saturation and experimentation close to that of industrial dance music. It would spawn subgenres such as gabber.

Hardcore is rooted in the 1970s and early 1980s industrial music, specifically the elements of hard electronic dance music. Groups such as Throbbing Gristle, Coil, Cabaret Voltaire, SPK, Foetus and Einstürzende Neubauten produced music using a wide range of electronic instruments. The message diffused by industrial was then very provocative. Some of the musical sounds and experimentation of industrial have directly influenced hardcore since the beginning of the movement.

In the mid-1980s, under the influence of the Belgian group Front 242, electronic body music (EBM), a new genre more accessible and more dancing inspired by industrial and new wave, appeared. This style is characterized by minimalism, cold sounds unlike disco, funk or house, with powerful beats, generally combined with aggressive vocals and an aesthetic close to industrial or punk music. Under the influence of New Beat, another Belgian genre and acid house, EBM music became harder. All the elements were present for the arrival of hardcore. The beginnings of the genre, they are traced at the very end of the 1980s in Belgium, within the new beat scene with the titles : Rock to the Beat by 101 released in 1988, Saigon Nightmare by 101 released in 1988, Warbeat by Bassline Boys released in 1989, I Want You! by The Concrete Beat released in 1989, I Love You by The Acid Kids released in 1988, Doughnut Dollies by HNO3 released in 1988, Action in Paradise by Export released in 1988, Acid New-Beat by Tribe 22 released in 1988, I Sit On Acid by Lords Of Acid released in 1988, Acid Rock by Rhythm Device released in 1989, Double B by Dirty Harry released in 1989, Also Sprach Zarathustra by Bingo! released in 1989, Europe by Christine D released in 1989, Do That Dance by The Project released in 1990, in 1988 the Belgian new beat arrived in Frankfurt in West Germany.

The term hardcore is not new in the music world. It was first used to designate a more radical movement within punk rock (Black Flag, Minor Threat, Bad Brains...) which, in addition to hardening the music, also attached importance to their attitude and their way of life as in the street where it was born: violent, underground, but engaged and sincere. The term has then been reused when hip hop emerged in the late 1980s, designating the harder part of the hip hop, with the same characteristics: a harder sound, engaged lyrics and a whole way of life dedicated to the respect of the values shown by rappers like KRS-One or Public Enemy. The term hardcore techno has first been used by EBM groups like à;GRUMH..., Pankow, and Leæther Strip in the late 1980s, although their music had nothing to do with hardcore. à;GRUMH...'s Sucking Energy (Hard Core Mix), released in 1985, was the first track ever to use the term hardcore, within an EDM context.

In 1990, German producer Marc Trauner (also known as Mescalinum United) released the first hardcore techno track with "We Have Arrived". The British group Together released its track "Hardcore Uproar", also in 1990. Music journalist Simon Reynolds has written books on hardcore techno, covering bands related to the Belgium hardcore scene like Second Phase and T99 or Dutch hardcore bands such as L.A. Style and Human Resource. Many of the iconic "stabs" that would become part of hardcore were popularized by these and other Belgian techno producers during the early 1990s, like the "Mentasm" and the "Anastasia" stabs.

In the early 1990s, the terms "hardcore" and "darkcore" were also used to designate some more aggressive or high tempo forms of techno, breakbeat and drum and bass which were very popular in England, and from which have emerged several famous producers like N-Joi, The Prodigy, Altern-8 and Goldie. One of the earliest uses of the word in the context of English releases/the English rave scene which gained prominence was 1990's "Hardcore Uproar" by Together. The track's title was derived from a promoter of acid house parties of the same name that hosted controversial raves in and around the town of Blackburn, and was agreed on between the members of Together and Hardcore Uproar's organisers in exchange for letting them feature a recording of the crowd at one of their nights in the track. Symbolically, according to Together member Suddi Raval, the night they attended to acquire the recording also turned out to be the final event under the Hardcore Uproar banner before its founders were forced to disband and stop the raves by the police. A slogan associated with these events and the anti-establishment ethos behind them, "High On Hope", was later used on a 1991 release on Blackburn-based label All Around the World, aptly under the artist name Hardcore Uproar. Later English hardcore introduced sped up hip-hop breakbeats, piano breaks, dub and low frequency basslines and cartoon-like noises, which has been retrospectively called 'old skool' hardcore (a.k.a. breakbeat hardcore) and is widely regarded as the progenitor of happy hardcore (which later lost the breakbeats) and jungle (which alternatively lost the techno style keyboard stabs and piano breaks).

An important event in the popularization of the genre occurred with the release of the 1990 track "We Have Arrived" by the German producer Mescalinum United, of Frankfurt. Trauner founded the label Planet Core Productions in 1989 and has produced more than 500 tracks, including 300 by himself until 1996. Another important project of Trauner was PCP, popularizing a slow, heavy, minimal and very dark form of hardcore that is now designated as "darkcore" or "doomcore".

In the United States, the New York pioneer of techno Lenny Dee launched the first dedicated hardcore record label Industrial Strength Records in 1991 that has federated a large part of the American scene, making New York one of the biggest centers of early American hardcore. Other American producers on the label included Deadly Buda and the Horrorist, but the label has also produced producers from other nationalities. At the same time in Rotterdam, the DJs and producers Paul Elstak and Rob Fabrie popularized a speedier style, with saturated bass-lines, quickly known as "gabber", and its more commercial and accessible form, happy hardcore.