Sodium alginate-melamine sponge composites were fabricated by in-situ gelation of sodium alginate supported on the commercial melamine sponge (MS). MS serves as the three-dimensional skeleton for alginate coating and can effectively avoid the shrink of alginate, and thus makes the alginate-MS composites user-friendly and facile to recover. In the adsorption test, the adsorption process is pseudo-second order and matches the Langmuir model with the maximum adsorption capacity of 90.1 mg/g for copper ions. The alginate-MS is recyclable and presents enhanced mechanical properties compared with those of pristine MS. All these properties make such alginate-MS a promising candidate as an adsorbent for heavy metal removal. (C) 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.