Adsorptive desulfurization (ADS) from fuels is considered as the most promising strategy due to the advantage of low energy consumption, to treat on sulfur which would induce serious air pollution. In this work, Sn-based DESs with urea were firstly synthesized and introduced into hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) as both reaction solvents and metal sources. Adsorption experiments show that the as-prepared adsorbents present higher adsorption capacity for dibenzothiophene (DBT) from model oils as compared with the commercial BN. Especially, the Sn-BN-800 (SnO2 supported BN with OH groups substitution at B sites) shows the highest performance. By combining experimental and theoretical analysis, we propose that the performance enhancement arises from the pi-complexation and hydrogen bonding interaction between SnO2 and DBT. In addition, the OH groups, which were substituted at the edge site of B, may also enhance the electron transfer from DBT to Sn-BN-800, leading to the improved adsorption capacity. (C) 2019 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.