In catalyst deactivation processes, a final residual activity different from zero is frequently reported in the literature. This phenomenon occurs in different processes and for very different catalysts and causes of deactivation. In this work three different deactivation mechanisms which lead to the appearance of a residual final activity are analyzed. Such deactivation mechanisms correspond to the following situations: (i) hior polyfunctional catalysts or monofunctional catalysts with active sites of different strength; (ii) reversible formation of coke; and (iii) generation and disappearance, simultaneous and in equilibrium, of active sites. The deactivation kinetic equations corresponding to these three mechanisms are deduced and analyzed. These equations include, explain, and generalize all the previous empirical kinetic equations existing for this situation. Also, these equations, with two to four parameters, adjust all the a-t (or a-Cc) data with ,^ found in the literature.When a catalyst is deactivated, its activity does not always drop to zero but sometimes reaches a residual or steady-state activity, as, as shown in Figure 1. It is often difficult to say whether this activity is really constant with the time-on-stream (or with the coke content) or whether it decreases slightly or imperceptibly. The existence of this residual activity has been found by many authors (Barbier,