<p>Blast furnace dust (BF dust) primarily consists of metal oxides from iron, zinc, and lead, which are classified as valuables but can be detrimental to the environment and human health. This study describes pellet formation and investigates the recovery rate of valuable metals from BF dust by the iron-bath process. BF dust contains iron, zinc, lead, aluminum, magnesium, carbon, calcium, silicon, vanadium, and titanium. Iron dominantly exists in the forms of hematite (Fe₂O₃) and wustite (FeO), while magnesium and zinc exist in the form of ferrite. BF dust is pressed into cold-bonded pellets with the addition of iron ore and mixed binder. A sample of QT500-7 cast iron and cold-bonded pellets are placed in a corundum crucible and simultaneously heated in a non-isothermal reduction process. The effects of reaction temperature, holding time, basicity, and carbon–oxygen ratio on recovery rate are analyzed. The results show that oxides such as Fe₂O₃ and FeO are reduced to metal iron during the melting process of cold-bonded pellets. Oxides of zinc and lead are recovered as volatiles. Oxides of magnesium, calcium, aluminum, and silicon form a slag phase while carbon acts as a reductant. Vanadium and titanium form as inclusions in recovered iron nuggets. Pellet reduction is infeasible when basicity is less than 0.44. The metallization rate (MR) increases with increasing basicity but no or less significant increase at 1.2. Valuable recovery increases with increasing temperature, while it decreases when holding time exceeds 1h. The results of this study also reveal that iron recovery was greater than 98% when the basicity and C/O ratios were 1.0 and 1.2, respectively.</p> Graphical Abstract <p></p>