Removal thermodynamics and desorption studies of some heavy metal ions such as Co(II), Cu(II) and Pb(II) by polymeric surfaces such as poly 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (PHEMA) and copolymer 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate with monomer methyl methacrylate P(MMA-HEMA) as adsorbent surfaces from aqueous single solution were investigated with respect to the changes in pH of solution, adsorbent composition, contact time and temperature in the individual aqueous solution. The linear correlation coefficients of Langmuir and Freundlich isotherms were obtained and the results revealed that the Langmuir isotherm fitted the experiment results better than Freundlich isotherm. Using the Langmuir model equation, the monolayer removal capacity of PHEMA surface was found to be 0.7388, 0.8396 and 3.0367 mg/g for Co(II), Cu(ΙΙ) and Pb(II) ions and removal capacity of P(MMA-HEMA) was found to be 28.8442, 31.1526 and 31.4465 mg/g for Co(II), Cu(ΙΙ) and Pb(II) ions, respectively. Changes in the standard Gibbs free energy (ΔG⁰), standard enthalpy (ΔH⁰) and standard entropy (ΔS⁰) showed that the removals of mentioned ions onto PHEMA and P(MMA-HEMA) are spontaneous and exothermic at 293–323 K. The maximum desorption efficiency was 75.26% for Pb(II) using 0.100 M HNO₃, 70.10% for Cu(II) using 0.100 M HCl, 59.20% for 0.100 M HCl 63.67% Co(II).