The work aims to investigate the influence of the type and amount of crosslinker, initiator amount and polymerization temperature on the water-absorbability of poly(acrylic acid) europium(PAAEu) complex and study the influence of different crosslinkers on luminescence properties of PAAEu. The water-absorbent resin of PAAEu was prepared through the inverse suspension polymerization, with cyclohexane and n-hexane as the continuous phases, span60 as the suspension stabilizer, potassium persulfate as the initiator, and N,N'-methylene bin-acrylamide (MBA) and EuCl3 as the crosslinkers. The water absorbency of resin could reach 491.21 when the crosslinker and initiator were respectively 0.27% and 1.3% of the monomer mass, and the polymerization temperature was 68 ℃. In addition, the thermogravimetric (TG) analysis showed that, the extension starting temperature of the water absorbent resin was 333.1 ℃, indicating the good thermal stability. The resin prepared with MBA and EuCl3 as the mixed crosslinker showed good luminescence properties through the emission spectrum test. The water-absorbent resin of PAAEu complex with better properties of luminescence and water-absorbability can be obtained when the mixture of MBA and EuCl3 is used as the crosslinker.