Bruch was born in 1980 in West Germany to a German father and Austrian mother. He grew up in Munich with five siblings. He began acting during his years at gymnasium and was involved with student acting groups. After completing his university-entrance diploma, he studied performing arts at the Max Reinhardt Seminar in Vienna, Austria. Bruch made a deliberate choice while studying to commit himself to acting for television and film, as opposed to theater. During this time, he made some of his first television appearances. He graduated in 2005.

Bruch spent the beginning of his career primarily playing small roles in German television and TV movie productions. His first noteworthy role was as Axi in the 2005 German television movie Rose, for which he won a German Television Award for Best Supporting Actor. The year 2008 was notable for Bruch’s career as he acted in a number of movies including the French film Female Agents, the English-language German biopic The Red Baron as Oberleutnant Lothar Freiherr von Richthofen, the Oscar-nominated German film The Baader Meinhof Complex as Stefan Aust, as well as the Oscar-winning American film The Reader.

After Generation War, Bruch starred in a variety of film and television productions of varying scopes until 2016 when he was cast in Babylon Berlin. In Babylon Berlin, Bruch stars as the main character, police inspector Gereon Rath, who investigates a series of crimes in Weimar Republic-era Berlin. The first two series of the show were filmed over eight months beginning in May 2016 and released consecutively in Fall 2017. Babylon Berlin has been very popular in Germany as well as with international audiences and has elevated Bruch to international prominence; Bruch is considered one of Germany’s upcoming stars. For his portrayal, Bruch received a 2018 Golden Camera Award and shares an Adolf Grimme Award with the Babylon Berlin team.

Bruch lives in Berlin with his partner, actress Miriam Stein. They had a child together in 2017. Bruch met Stein in 2009 on the set of the film Young Goethe in Love. Notably, they later starred together in 2013’s Generation War, 2014’s Tour de Force, and 2015’s Das goldene Ufer.

The show went on a yearlong production hiatus during which Bruch filmed two movies; in 2018, he played a role in the wide-release American film The Girl in the Spider’s Web and filmed the German production Rocca Changes the World. In late 2018, Bruch began the six-month shoot for the third series of Babylon Berlin which premiered in Germany in January 2020. A fourth series starring Bruch is expected to be released in 2020 or 2021.

In 2019, Bruch, along with other German actors and artists like Daniel Brühl, signed a petition advocating against the election of a far-right Alternative for Germany mayoral candidate in Görlitz, Germany, an oft-used filming location in Europe. In June 2020, Bruch took part in the video “Was Sie Mitgenommen Haben” for the United Nations High Commissioner For Refugees (UNHCR).