The reductive amination of benzaidehyde with NH3 in the presence of six different 5 wt.% Pd/C and a 5 wt.% Ru/C catalysts is examined. The catalytic activity is higher upon oxidative treatment of the carbon support. The selectivity to a particular amine appears to be a function of the degree of metal dispersion in the catalyst and of the nature of the metal. The activity and selectivity are not influenced by the method used for the oxidation of the support. They are not significantly affected either by the addition of Sn as a promoter. Despite the complexity of the mechanism of the reductive amination, a kinetic model based on a simplified reaction network is developed and fitted to the experimental data using the BatchCAD(TM) software. The results allow the evaluation of the apparent rate constants of each of the steps of the proposed mechanism, which helps to understand the correlation between the nature of the catalyst and the selectivity observed. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.