A new theoretical formula can be used to calculate superficial velocity for particle separation with a critical condition, and it is based on the size, density, terminal velocity, Reynold number of the particle and equipment parameters. In a continuous system, a series of fractionation experiments were conducted to quantify the separation performance for 0–2 mm coal particles under various factors, including channel spacing, solids throughput and split fluidization rate. The separation performance considers the ash content and yield of products varying with the particle size. A great fluidization environment can be created by the 6 mm channel spacing. For the solids throughput of 10.20 t/(m2h) provides a well effective separation in the narrow channels. In addition, the split fluidization of 0.0058 m/s can produce a higher shear induce force in the inclined channels to prevent the low-density particles from being lost in the underflow. The theoretical superficial velocity calculated by the new formula is 0.042 m/s, which can report the particles with the upper and lower size reach at 9-fold to the overflow, it is almost the same as the actual separation fluidization velocity of 0.04 m/s. Meanwhile, the data obtained under each separation condition is basically consistent with data of the sink-float mothed, which shows a good separation performance for the Reflux Classifier.