The combustion process in diesel engines is essentially controlled by the dynamics of the fuel spray. Thus accurate modeling of spray process is vital to accurately model the combustion process in diesel engines. In this work, a new hybrid spray model was developed by coupling the cavitation induced spray sub model to KHRT spray model. This new model was implemented into KIVA4 CFD code. The new developed spray model was extensively validated against the experimental data of non-vaporizing and vaporizing spray obtained from constant volume combustion chamber (CVCC) available in literature. The results were compared on the basis of liquid length, spray penetration and spray images. The model was also validated against the engine combustion characteristics data like in-cylinder pressure and heat release rate. The new spray model very well captures both spray characteristics and combustion characteristics. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.