In view of the problem of membrane fouling in the long-term operation of membrane bioreactor (MBR), the causes and influencing factors of membrane fouling in MBR were described. The mechanism of reducing membrane fouling in electrically coupled membrane bioreactor (EMBR) was analyzed, and the inhibitory effects of conductive membrane and self-generated electric field on membrane fouling were introduced. The analysis shows that EMBR can control membrane fouling in situ through electrochemical actions such as electroosmosis, electrophoresis, electrooxidation and electrochemical quorum quenching. The application of the self-generated electric field of microbial fuel cell (MFC) in EMBR can reduce membrane fouling and recover part of energy in the form of electric energy. The application of conductive membrane optimizes the structure of EMBR. The MFC-MBR coupling process with self-generated electric field has a good application prospect.