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Abstract Global warming, climate change, fossil fuel depletion and steep hikes in the price of environmentally friendly hydrocarbons motivate researchers to investigate CO 2 hydrogenation for hydrocarbons production. However, due to the reaction complexities and varieties of produced species, the process mechanism and subsequently estimation of the kinetic parameters have been controversial yet. Therefore, estimating the kinetic parameters using Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) and Differential Evolution (DE) optimization algorithms based on Langmuir-Hinshelwood-Hougen-Watson (LHHW) mechanism is proposed as a possible remedy to fulfil the requirements. To this end, a one-dimensional heterogeneous model comprising detailed reaction rates of reverse water gas shift (RWGS), Fisher-Tropsch (FT) reactions and direct hydrogenation (DH) of CO 2 is developed. It is observed that ABC exhibiting 6.3% error in predicting total hydrocarbons selectivity is superior to DE algorithm with 32.9% error. Therefore, the model employed the estimated kinetic parameters obtained via ABC algorithm, is exploited for products distribution analysis. Results reveal that maximum 73.21% hydrocarbons (C 1 C 4) selectivity can be achieved at 573 K and 1 MPa with 0.85% error compared to the experimental value of 72.59%. Accordingly, the proposed model can be exploited as a powerful tool for evaluating and predicting the performance of CO 2 hydrogenation to hydrocarbons process. Graphical abstract Image 1 Highlights • Studying kinetic parameters of CO 2 hydrogenation has remained controversial. • One-dimensional heterogeneous model including detailed reaction rates is developed. • Kinetic parameters are estimated via ABC and DE algorithms using experimental data. • Components distribution along reactor length are presented based on ABC algorithm. • Performance of the theoretical reactor is compared with available experimental data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]