The presence of pharmaceutical and personal care products (PPCP) in wastewater is an emerging concern, which is in need of a sustainable solution. Advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) and adsorption are the most effective technologies available for PPCP treatment. However, the energy cost, post treatment, etc. downplay the sustainability of these technologies. As a result, biologically driven processes are investigated in-depth for cost-effective removal of PPCPs. In the current study, biological removal of PPCPs was investigated using metronidazole (MNZ) as the model pharmaceutical pollutant and acclimatized suspended biomass as the degraders. In the light of expanding the performance of MNZ removal, further improvement in the process was sought by exploring the application of biomass immobilized in an alginate matrix. The effects of amendments, i.e., powdered activated carbon (PAC) and starch, bead composition, bead concentration and MNZ concentration were also explored via batch studies. Furthermore, the optimal run conditions were simulated for treatment of multiple PPCP laden wastewater. Carbamazepine (CBZ), ciprofloxacin (CIP) and sulfamethoxazole (SMX) were selected as the other pollutants in the multipollutant matrix. Finally, immobilized biomass at optimum operating conditions were used in combination with a membrane separation system to address the field applicability of the treatment option. It was observed that alginate immobilized biomass amended with PAC performed better than starch amendment, in terms of MNZ removal and ammonia removal. Moreover, the beads showed distinct improvement in removal efficiency and rate compared with the unamended alginate matrix. The bead concentration of 5% was sufficient to remove MNZ concentration of 1 ppm. Finally, the best performing bead selected from the batch study was used for multipollutant investigation. CBZ and MNZ showed >60% removal under all investigated initial concentrations (0.05, 0.1, 0.25 and 0.5 mg/L). However, the removal varied for each compound at different initial concentrations, and the variation was depending on the presence of other compounds. Finally, the beads were applied in a continuous membrane bioreactor (MBR) system. The immobilized run in the MBR accounted for >48% removal for all selected pharmaceuticals. Immobilized biomass system in MBR showed a higher removal (especially for CBZ) or comparable removal than the freely-suspended biomass system for all selected pollutants. The improvement in the replacement of suspended biomass with immobilized biomass was very apparent in specific removal efficiency. However, the TOC removal was comparatively lower and necessitated the need for further treatment. It was observed that the beads are stable for 18 days. Further research is needed for improving the stability for longer duration. Overall, the immobilized biomass beads are very useful for removing pharmaceutical and other similar pollutants in the MBR system.