Bruch married Clara Tuczek, a singer he had met whilst touring in Germany, in Berlin on 3 January 1881. The couple returned to Liverpool and took lodgings in Sefton Park. Their daughter, Margaretha, was born in Liverpool in 1882.
Bruch died, quietly and painlessly, in his house in Berlin-Friedenau in 1920.[4] He was buried next to his wife, who had died on 27 August the previous year, at the Old St. Matthäus churchyard at Berlin-Schöneberg. His daughter Margaretha later had carved on the gravestone "Music is the language of God".[4]