2,4-diphenyl-4-methyl-1-pentene is a main impurity in phenol. In this paper, acidified activated carbon with sulfuric acid were used to remove the impurity from phenol. Combined with solid-phase microextraction (SPME) and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), the adsorption capacity and mechanism of acidified activated carbon were analyzed. Unacidified and sulfated activated carbon was characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The adsorption mechanism of 2,4-diphenyl-4-methyl-1-pentene on sulfuric acid acidified activated carbon was investigated. The acidified activated carbon of sulfuric acid has much better adsorption capacity than the unacidified activated carbon on 2,4-diphenyl-4-methyl-1-pentene. The sulfuric acid acidified activated carbon has no obvious adsorption effectiveness on mesityl oxide and 2-methylbenzofuran. The optimum adsorption time of sulfuric acid acidified activated carbon for 2,4-diphenyl-4-methyl-1-pentene was 1 h, the removal rate was 82%. The Freundlich isothermal adsorption model can describe the adsorption behavior of 2,4-diphenyl-4-methyl-1-pentene on sulfuric acid acidified activated carbon. The adsorption process conforms to the pseudo-second-order kinetics model and is a chemical adsorption. The sulfuric acid acidified activated carbon can remove 2,4-diphenyl-4-methyl-1-pentene form phenol very well, which provide a theoretical basis and technical support for the phenol industry.