Palladium catalysts supported on manganese oxides octahedral molecular sieves (OMS-2), Pb doped OMS-2 (Pb-OMS-2) and perovskite-type La0.5Pb0.5MnO3 were prepared for investigating the deactivation causes of catalysts during the oxidative carbonylation of phenol. The catalytic experiments on three different sets of catalysts demonstrated that they were inactive after continuous reaction for 22 h. XRD patterns and HRTEM images demonstrated that carbonaceous pollution and palladium leaching occurred during the reaction process. The solvent and oxygen have significant impact on the palladium leaching by ICP-AES analysis. In addition, hot filtration tests and SH-HZSM-5 adsorption studies indicated that the leached palladium species are not active species. The results of XPS patterns and H-2-TPR profiles showed that aggregation and reduction of Pd species was another deactivation cause. It was discovered that lattice oxygen species decreased and palladium aggregated, which hindered the re-oxidation of Pd(0) to Pd(II). In summary, carbonaceous pollution, Pd leaching, aggregation and consumption of oxygen species hindered the redox recycling of palladium, which resulted in the deactivation of supported palladium catalysts for the oxidative carbonylation of phenol. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.