A novel solar energy driven and membrane-based air humidification-dehumidification desalination (MHDD) system is designed and constructed. To realize a water-salt separation, a hollow fiber membrane module is employed as the humidifier to humidify air with solar energy heated saline water. The humidified air is then cooled and condensed to obtain distilled water. A detailed theoretical model is developed and validated to evaluate the performance of the proposed MHDD system. The whole model includes submodels for the solar collector, the water tank, the membrane humidifier, and the vapor condenser. At a specified membrane area, the effects of the water tank volume and solar collector area on the system performance such as the electric energy consumption for water production (SEC), the coefficient of performance (COP), etc., are analyzed. The optimal water tank volume and the optimal solar collector area for the desalination system are evaluated. In addition, an economic analysis on the whole system reveals that the system needs a low maintenance cost to make the water production competitive. Generally it provides an attractive alternative to small-scale, stand-alone desalination systems that could provide high purity drinkable water. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.