The steam-assisted conversion of pre-deposited precursor film on an aluminum alloy into a continuous anti-corrosion zeolite coating was demonstrated. It took just 12 h of reaction to produce a 10 mu m thick dense film of closely packed zeolite nanocrystals. The anti-corrosion performance of this coating was better compared to that prepared by the conventional in-situ crystallization method having a similar thickness. The proposed method eliminated the unwanted suspended zeolite by-product that always comes with the previous process. The need of a fluoropolymer-lined autoclave could also be relaxed. Consequently, zeolite anti-corrosion coatings may be applied more cost-effectively onto a larger substrate. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.