Methylation of formaldehyde with various aromatics under functional ionic liquids catalysis has been developed. Among the ionic liquids investigated, triphenyl-(4-sulfobutyl)-phosphonium triflate ([TTPBs][CF3SO3]) showed high activity and afforded excellent yields of diarylmethane derivatives. A mechanism for the catalytic performance of [TTPBs][CF3SO3] is proposed. Besides, the catalyst can simply be separated from the reaction mixture by centrifugation and be recycled ten times without noticeable loss of activity.