The quantitative understanding of the dissolution of nuclear fuel materials is essential for the process design and development of an industrial-scale nuclear fuel reprocessing plant. The main objective of this review article is to analyze the published data related to the dissolution of important nuclear materials, namely, urania, plutonia, thoria, and their oxides in the existing literature. The published results on rate-controlling step and reaction mechanism of dissolution processes are reconciled and reviewed in this work. Clear suggestions are made for future research work for the identification of rate-controlling step. Suggestions are also provided to overcome the shortfalls in the published data for the identification of intrinsic kinetics and mass-transfer rates. © 2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston 2019.