Abstract: Oil shale contains a large amount of clay minerals and thus has a certain adsorption capacity for metal ions. The influence factors and adsorption kinetics of oil shale adsorption on cobalt ions(Co²⁺) are studied by static adsorption method. The results show that the oil shale granularity, solution concentration, pH value and absorption time all have certain effect on the adsorption capability. The adsorption amount of Co²⁺ by oil shale increases with the decrease of sample grain size. With the increase of initial concentration of cobalt ions, the total amount of adsorbed Co²⁺ also increases. With the solution pH ranging from 3 to 8, the adsorption amount and rate of Co²⁺ increase with the increase of pH value. According to the adsorption kinetics, the adsorption process of Co²⁺ conforms to the pseudo-second-order kinetic process and intraparticle diffusion mechanism.