AbstractSpontaneous nucleation of water droplets in moist air or steam may result in droplet spectra which are complex in shape and which span a broad range of sizes. This is particularly true if the flow is transonic or supersonic with shock waves present, or if an already droplet‐laden flow re‐expands to give secondary or tertiary nucleations. Computation of such flows requires careful modelling of the size distributions if two‐phase behaviour is to be accurately predicted. In this paper, three methods are presented for treating size distributions and growth of the liquid phase in condensing steam: a mixed Eulerian–Lagrangian method, a fully Eulerian method, and a method based on moments of the droplet spectra. These are compared by computing condensing flow within a one‐dimensional supersonic nozzle under conditions that yield very different types of size spectra. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.