Vanadium phosphate (VPO) is an interesting catalytic material because of its ability to catalyze reactions, such as partial oxidations with high selectivity. Selective gas phase oxidation of methanol to formaldehyde is achieved over simple aluminum promoted vanadium phosphate (Al-VPO) impregnated heterogeneous catalyst. A series of Al-VPO (3, 5, 10, 15 and 20 wt%) catalysts have been synthesized and the catalytic behavior has been studied by carrying out methanol oxidation. The catalytic oxidation runs revealed a significant effect of the vanadium phosphate giving 100% selectivity to formaldehyde at 200 degrees C. The conversion can be enhanced to 94% with the sacrifice of the selectivity. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.