Forward osmosis (FO) membrane is paramount to the progress and implementation of FO process. However, typical FO membranes are confronted with many unsatisfactory issues, including the low water flux, high fouling propensity and the poor long-term operation stability in most cases, which confines the practical application of FO process to a large extent. This study proposes a feasible way to mitigate the internal concentration polarization (ICP) and optimize the polyamide (PA) layer structure of as-fabricated thin-film composite forward osmosis (TFC-FO) membranes simultaneously by incorporating phosphorylated titanium dioxide (p-TiO2) in polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) substrate. P-TiO2 nanoparticies with abundant phosphate groups were prepared through a chemical absorption approach followed by the thermal post-treatment. Superior water flux and the better antifouling properties of the resultant PVDF/p-TiO2 TFC-FO membrane was achieved, taking advantage of the more compact and smoother PA layer as a result of the confined migration of amine monomer during interfacial polymerization (IP). In addition, effects of p-TiO2 content on morphological changes and physicochemical properties of modified substrates and the construction of top PA layer are studied and elaborated systemically via many characterizations as well as the permeation tests. As a result, the water flux decline of PVDF/p-TiO2 TFC membrane is much lower (16.0%) than that (similar to 31.3%) of the pristine TFC membrane, in the long-term (20 h) dynamic fouling test against 500 ppm humic acid (HA) solution. Therefore, PVDF/p-TiO2 TFC-FO membrane with improved water flux and low fouling tendency is beneficial for wastewater treatment and desalination process, especially for the treatment of brackish water with high fouling tendency or under harsh conditions. (C) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.