Abstract: Sponge-bed trickling filter is a recirculating aquaculture systems technology that capable of managing Total Ammonia Nitrogen (TAN) in water until it reaches its safe threshold for fish. The study was conducted on a laboratory scale using a 13×13×28 cm3 sponge media trickling filter. The trickling filter height and flowrate were 40 cm and 3 L/min, respectively. The influent used was synthetic wastewater with water quality similar to Osphronemus goramy Lac. Aquaculture with an average weight of 0.013 g derived from the addition of ammonia solution with load variations of 0.4, 0.6 and 0.8 mg TAN/L. During seven repetitions of observations at each load, the results showed that the loading of 0.8 mg TAN/L resulted in a relatively high removal efficiency and a stable Volumetric TAN Removal (VTR) of 96.41±0.880% and 0.0157±0.00105 g/m3 day. The nitrification reaction took place on first order kinetics with the highest rate of removal occurring at 0.8 mg TAN/L load of 0.67 g/m2 day. First-order kinetics is not an optimum condition for sponge-bed trickling filter operations but the 0.8 mg TAN/L load selection minimizes the impact of first-order kinetics as it results in relatively stable percentages and VTRs.