It covers an area of approximately 115 square kilometres (44 sq mi) [1] including the suburbs of Dandenong North, Doveton, Endeavour Hills, Eumemmerring, Hallam, Lysterfield South, Narre Warren, and Narre Warren North; and parts of Berwick, Dandenong, Harkaway, Mulgrave, Narre Warren South, Noble Park, and Noble Park North.

Until 1996, the division was based on Glen Waverley and Mount Waverley, and was a fairly safe seat for the Liberal Party, but since then its boundaries have been extended southwards, making it a marginal Labor Party seat.

[4] Its most prominent member was Sir Billy Snedden, Liberal Party leader from 1972 to 1975 and Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives from 1976 to 1983.

Bruce has three times the proportion of families with Chinese backgrounds as the state average.

[5] While a stronghold for the center-left Labor Party, religious migrant communities in the electorate rallied strongly against the Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey in 2017, since the survey process was not trusted by both Islamic and Chinese Christian migrant communities, who believe it had been hijacked by out-of-touch inner-city leaders.