In this study, physical and chemical characterizations of calcium methoxide were investigated to assess its performance as an excellent solid base catalyst using some instrumental methods, such as BET surface area measurement, scanning electron micrographs and particle size distribution. Then, it was used to catalyze transesterification of soybean oil to biodiesel with methanol. The effects of various factors such as mass ratio of catalyst to oil, reaction temperature and volume ratio of methanol to oil were studied to optimize the reaction conditions. The results showed that calcium methoxide has strong basicity and high catalytic activity as a heterogeneous solid base catalyst and it was obtained a 98% biodiesel yield within 2 h in this reaction. Besides, the recycling experiment results showed it had a long catalyst lifetime and could maintain activity even after being reused for 20 cycles. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.