Because of the complex sintering kinetics it has been a continual challenge to link the sintering process of ceramic membranes to its permeable and retention properties. The present work presents a numerical model based on the realistic sintering kinetic law to study the dependence of the porosity, pore size and permeate flux of alpha-alumina membranes on the sintering process. Our emphasis is the effects of initial porosity and particle size distribution on the final performance of the membranes after sintering. Our results indicate that the pore size and permeate flux are mainly controlled by the initial porosity and slightly controlled by the departure of the particle size distribution from the mean particle size. The evolution of the porosity, pore size and permeate flux over a range of particle size, sintering time and temperature can be collapsed to a general curve by adapting a scaling time. The simulation results are validated by comparing to previously published experimental data. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.