In the mid 1930s, the minesweeping flotillas of the Kriegsmarine consisted of old ships build in World War I. To replace this old ships, a class of modern minesweepers, the "Mboot35" was designed.

The result was a very maneuverable and seaworthy ship exceeding the expectations. Heavily armed those ships were often called "Channel Destroyers" by the British during World War II.  Despite the successful design, several factors  prevented that a large number of ships were build during the war. The boats were very expensive and complicated to build, therefore a more simple design had to be developed (which later got the Minensuchboot 1940). The engines were difficult to maintain and needed specially skilled personal which was not available in the required numbers. Since the Mboot35 had oil fired boilers, they also suffered from the oil shortage in the later years of the war.

A total of 69 ships were build in eight different shipyards, 34 were lost during the war. After the war, 17 were taken over by the US Navy, 5 by the Royal Navy and 13 by the Soviet Navy which all were used in the Black Sea until the 1960s. Five of the ships taken over by the USA were returned to Germany in 1956/57 and were used by the Bundesmarine.