PURPOSE: To provide a separating method capable of separating phenol in a nonaqueous solvent without using an alkali, unlike a conventional extraction method or an active carbon absorption method.

CONSTITUTION: A nonaqueous solvent containing phenol is brought into contact with an acrylic weakly basic ion exchange resin to make phenol adsorbed and the ion exchange resin containing adsorbed phenol is treated with a phenol- soluble nonaqueous solvent to elute the phenol. As the ion exchange resin, an ion exchange resin obtained by introducing one or two or more kinds of primary amines, secondary amines and tertiary amines into an ion exchange resin using an acrylic-divinylbenzene copolymer as a substrate is used. As the phenol-soluble nonaqueous solvent, a solvent containing a polar solvent such as acetone, methanol, ethanol, propanol or acetonitrile, especially acetone is preferably used. An absorption amount ≥2 times larger than the ion exchange capacity of the ion exchange resin is obtained by using the acrylic weakly basic ion exchange resin.