Landfill leachate (LFL) is a complex wastewater that poses a serious environmental threat for the public health, owing to the toxic and recalcitrant nature of its components.Hence, an effective treatment is imperative before being discharged into the environment.To ensure an appropriate treatment, a thorough comprehension of LFL physico-chem. properties is essential.In addition to conventional contaminants such as COD, BOD, solids, ammonia, metals, recent studies have reported the presence of dissolved organic matter (DOM) and emerging contaminants such as bisphenols, PFAS, xenobiotics in trace concentrationsWhile conventional detection techniques are chem. and time consuming and reveal limited information regarding DOM, spectroscopic techniques such as UV-visible spectroscopy, Fourier-transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry, excitation emission matrix fluorescence spectroscopy are comparably more efficient, and effective.Furthermore, the conventional MBR has shown lower efficiency for treating old LFL and removal of heavy metals, phosphorus, micropollutants and recalcitrant.However, novel configurations in MBR such as high-retention MBRs (nanofiltration-MBR, osmotic MBR, and membrane distillation bioreactor), and electrochem. MBR are more effective alternatives with excellent removal efficiencies of micropollutants, and pharmaceuticals.One of the major limitations in MBR is membrane fouling which reduces the lifetime of membrane and in turn increases the operational cost of MBRs.Novel strategies such as elec. or mech. assisted scouring, chem. cleaning, enzymic treatment and the development of novel nanomaterial-based membranes have been proposed to mitigate membrane fouling in MBRs.Further, it is essential to decipher the microbial dynamics in MBR which facilitates contaminant removal by using genome sequencing tools and understand the economic and environmental aspects of MBR.