Layered double hydroxides (LDHs), also known as hydrotalcite-like compounds, are widely used in many fields due to their unique structural advantages. Based on LDHs, a wide range of metal catalysts could be synthesized with high metal dispersion, tunable acid-base properties, facile but flexible preparation methods, strong metal-support interaction, and thermal stability. Owing to these outstanding advantages, LDH-derived materials manifest great potential as catalysts, particularly in hydrogenation and hydrogenolysis reactions. More than 200 papers published in the past five years in this field clearly indicated the rapid development of these materials. In this respect, it is imperative and essential to provide a timely review to summarize the current progress and motivate greater research effort on hydrogenation and hydrogenolysis catalysts derived from LDHs. In this review, the applications of LDH-derived materials as heterogeneous catalysts in various hydrogenation and hydrogenolysis reactions were comprehensively discussed. Hydrogenation of unsaturated chemical bonds, hydrodeoxygenation of oxygenated compounds, hydrogenolysis of carbon–carbon bonds and hydrogenation of nitrites and nitriles were described. This review demonstrates the extraordinary potentials of LDH-derived catalysts in hydrogenation and hydrogenolysis reactions, and it is undoubted that LDH-derived catalysts will play an even more significant role in the foreseeable future.

In-depth studies on condensate structures during furfural rearrangement to cyclopentanone are presented. Polymeric condensates with high levels of conjugation were the main cause for carbon loss and catalyst deactivation.