The potential benefits of surfactant-conditioned sludge dewatering treatment with acid/alkali pretreatment were investigated in this study. The water content of dewatered sludge (W C) and specific resistance of filtration (SRF) were used to evaluate sludge dewaterability. Extracellular polymeric substance (EPS) content, bound water content, zeta potential, and rheological properties were measured to explain the change of dewaterability observed in the conditioning process. By introducing dodecyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chloride (DDBAC), the EPS content of the sludge supernatant changed, and bound water content, charge strength, and apparent viscosity decreased simultaneously. Although DDBAC-conditioned sludge in strong alkaline had low bound water content, W C and SRF increased rapidly because of the dramatically increasing of EPS in sludge supernatant. Remarkable decrement was observed in bound water content and W C in DDBAC-conditioned sludge which was in weak acid environment for comparison. The results indicated that 75 mg/g of DDBAC at pH 4.84 was the optimum under which W C and SRF were at their lowest point in sludge, 58.22 % and 0.521 × 10(13) m/kg, respectively.