The scope of this study is to research the removal of NH4 +-N from domestic wastewater using different porous and reactive materials by 1) increasing biological activity and 2) adsorption process. Experimental setup consisted of pilot scale VFCW (2.3 m2), which were put in operation in August 2014 receiving real raw domestic wastewater near a vertical flow wastewater treatment plant in the central region of France (L‘Encloitre, 37360). Two types of filtration media were tested 1) Leca® (L30M) and 2) natural zeolite (Z10M). Pilots were fed under regular feeding/resting periods (3´/7 days) and the nominal loading rate was of 300 g COD m-2 d-1 and 33 g.N.m2.d-1 in the operating filter. Results show a good treatment efficiency of domestic wastewater by the two French-Vertical Flow constructed Wetland (VFCWs) with more than 94% and 85% removal rate for TSS and COD for both filters respectively. Results also showed an increase of the NH4 +-N with the use of natural zeolite. The overall removal of more than 80% observed for Z10M seems to be linked to the effect of the ion exchange and adsorption properties of zeolite.