Scour leads to the loss of soil around monopile foundations for offshore wind turbines, which affects their structural safety. In this paper, the effect of scour on the lateral behaviour of monopiles was extensively investigated using finite element analysis, and calibration and comparison were undertaken using centrifuge tests. Piles with three slenderness ratios, i.e., 3, 5 and 8, were studied by keeping the diameter constant and varying the embedment length. Three scour types (local narrow, local wide and global) and four scour depths (0.5D, 1D, 1.5D and 2D; D signifies the pile diameter) were considered in this investigation. The results indicate that the lateral resistance of the pile is the greatest in the case of local narrow scour, followed by that in the cases of local wide scour and global scour. When the scour depth is larger than 1D, the influence of the scour type on the pile lateral bearing behaviour is insignificant. The influence of the scour type and scour depth on the pile lateral bearing behaviour is broadly similar for piles with slenderness ratios of 3, 5 and 8. However, the piles featured with smaller embedment lengths show a larger decrease rate in their lateral capacity, which means the effect of scour should cause more concern on small slenderness ratio monopiles.@en