The objective of this paper is to develop and validate a reliable, efficient and robust artificial neural network (ANN) model for online monitoring and prediction of crude oil fouling behavior for industrial shell and tube heat exchangers. To explore the complex dynamics of fouling, a new modeling strategy based on moving-window neural network approach is proposed. The essential character of this modeling approach is online updating of the ANN model whenever a new data block is available, so that it can effectively capture the slowly changing of process dynamics. The results of these models have been compared with appropriate sets of experimental data. The mean relative errors (MRE) of training and prediction subsets were about 6.61% and 8.06%, respectively. Since the data extraction in the refinery was performed every 2 h, the modeling approach led to an MRE of about 8% for fouling rate prediction of the next 50 h. (C) 2011 The Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.