Hydrogenation of phenol in the liquid phase has been studied. The reaction system was a stirred tank reactor with the catalyst-highly dispersed platinum/gamma-alumina prepared by adsorption from an aqueous solution of H2PtCl6-suspended as a slurry. In order to prevent the mass transport steps to control the reaction rate, several experiments were carried out varying stirring rate, catalyst particle size, and catalyst weight. In the studied conditions, working with stirring rate above 9 Hz, catalyst particle size below 50 mum, and catalyst weight below 0.5 g assured the kinetic regime. The influence of pressure, temperature, and catalyst platinum content on both initial activity and selectivity was analyzed, for the chemically-controlled regime. Increasing total pressure was found to increase activity almost linearly and to decrease selectivity. The apparent activation energies for phenol consumption and cyclohexanone and cyclohexanol formation (from phenol) were determined.