The use of sacrificial anodes for the electrochemical synthesis of metallic complexes

•The applicability of the direct electrosynthesis of metallic complexes is provided.•The versatility of the method is shown with a wide variety of metals and ligands.•The technique is enormously simple, fast, very selective and involves a single step.•Collateral reactions and unexpected results are also reported.•The enormous synthetic potential of this procedure is widely described.

In this work, a compilation of electrochemically prepared metallic complexes is presented. All of them were synthesized by using a single step electrolytic process. This procedure is useful in the syntheses of homoleptic and heteroleptic complexes. Perhaps the most important point is the versatility of the proligands which can be used for the syntheses: a variety of functional groups and a number of coordination modes for the different ligands are reported.However, unpredictable results were also obtained in some cases; these results were successfully interpreted and, many times, they were useful for new syntheses, both by using the results themselves or for the prevention against non desirable products. A summary of these unexpected situations is also presented.

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