AbstractMinimum spouting velocity was measured using different bed heights with six different particles. A statistical analysis of the reported correlations for minimum spouting velocity based on the present and literature data was made and the estimated. Absolute average relative deviation (AARD) and bias were found to be very high, and the reason could be attributed to the fact that the applicability of the literature correlations are restricted to a limited range of fundamental and operating variables, and hence empirical correlation for the estimation of minimum spouting velocity has been developed using a data bank consisting of 280 present experimental data along with 174 literature data. The predictive ability of the present proposed correlation was tested, and it was found to be a good fit for a wide range of operating conditions. Copyright © 2009 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.