The effects of axial dispersion and Langmuir isotherm on transient behavior of sorption and intraparticle diffusion in fixed-beds packed with monodisperse shell-typelinert core spherical sorbents are studied. The system of partial differential equations of the mathematical model is solved numerically using finite difference methods. Results are presented in the form of breakthrough curves for adsorption and desorption processes. Results reveal that the shape of the breakthrough curves is influenced by both hydrodnamic and kinetic factors. Hydrodynamic factor is governed by axial dispersion and is controlled by changes of Peclet number. Simulation results reveal that when linear adsorption isotherm is used, the effect of axial dispersion oil breakthrough curves of the system is important for Peclet numbers smaller than 50, whereas, for Langmuir isotherm axial dispersion is considerable for Peclet numbers less than 80. In addition, affects of type of adsorption isotherms and size of adsorbents on breakthrough curves are investigated, and results are compared with existing reports in the pertinent literature. (C) 2009 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J. 55: 1784-1792, 2009