Abstract: The traditional powder phosphorus removal materials were difficult to separate from water due to its small particle size, which greatly limited its application in practical engineering. In this paper, granular phosphorus removal materials were prepared by using heat treated attapulgite clay as carrier (1~2 mm) and iron chloride (FeCl₃) to active load. The optimum modification conditions, reaction time, influencing factors and phosphorus removal efficiency of the materials were studied in detail. The results showed that the maximum adsorption capacity of attapulgite clay modified by 2 mol/L iron chloride solution was 4.27 mg/g, which was about 2 times of the phosphorus fixation capacity of the original clay. The adsorption of phosphorus on iron modified attapulgite was greatly affected by pH value. The removal rate of phosphorus decreased by about 10%, as the pH value of water body increased from 4 to 11. The adsorption kinetics showed that the adsorption of phosphorus on Fe-modified attapulgite was in accordance with the quasi-second-order kinetic equation, and 84.46% of the phosphorus could be removed within 24 hours. Best effect on the regeneration of iron modified attapulgite was found using 0.2 mol/L hydrochloric acid, and then the phosphrous adsorption efficiency of the regenerated adsorbent decreased by about 40%. The above results showed that iron modified attapulgite can be used as absorbent on water bodies with low phosphrous concentration and has great application prospect.