The present study focused on the effervescent atomization of oil-in-water emulsions and its influence on the internal emulsion structure. The impact of atomization conditions and nozzle geometry on an oil-in-water emulsion with varied viscosity ratio of disperse phase to emulsion was determined. The viscosity ratio is known as a key factor for the drop breakup in emulsification processes. The results depict that oil drops are broken up according to emulsification mechanisms during atomization. A maximum breakup was found for a viscosity ratio between 0.5 and 1. The expected stress dependency of the drop size change was observed for high viscosity ratios only. Relevance of elongational stress on the drop breakup was proven with significant drop size change at high viscosity ratios. The viscosity ratio thus allows for an efficient control of oil drop size change in effervescent atomization as the spray characteristics are invariant to viscosity changes within certain limits. (c) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.