ABSTRACT Water pollution arising from industrial effluents, particularly textile dyes and heavy metals, remains a persistent challenge for environmental protection and public health. Many conventional treatment technologies exhibit limited selectivity, high operational cost, or generate secondary waste streams, prompting sustained interest in alternative materials and treatment concepts. This review focuses on polymeric composite beads as a versatile platform for wastewater treatment, emphasizing synthesis routes, functionalization strategies, and pollutant removal mechanisms. By combining polymer matrices with inorganic fillers, carbonaceous phases, or bio‐derived additives, composite beads achieve enhanced adsorption through electrostatic attraction, chelation, ion exchange, and surface complexation, while maintaining structural integrity and reuse potential. Advances in material design have enabled improved adsorption capacity, selectivity, and regeneration behavior through controlled crosslinking, surface modification, and hierarchical architectures. Several challenges remain insufficiently resolved. Long‐term chemical and mechanical stability under variable pH, ionic strength, and multi‐contaminant conditions, regeneration‐induced degradation, additive leaching, and scale‐up from batch testing to flow‐based systems continue to hinder deployment. This review critically evaluates reported performance data by accounting for experimental conditions and system configuration, distinguishing proof‐of‐concept studies from application‐oriented investigations. Practical benchmarks for deployment readiness are proposed, prioritizing durability, safety, and lifecycle performance.
Edgar Clyde R. Lopez (Thu,) studied this question.