• • The UiO-66@dye-2 system achieves a solar-to-vapor conversion efficiency of 97.8% under 1-sun irradiation, significantly outperforming conventional photothermal materials and enabling high-yield freshwater production in energy-scarce regions.
• • Photocatalytic degradation of phenol reaches 95.4% under the same conditions, demonstrating dual functionality that addresses both water scarcity and organic pollutant removal in a single solar-driven process.
• • The material maintains stable degradation performance across highly acidic and alkaline environments, indicating robust chemical durability essential for treating industrial effluents with extreme pH values.
• • Defect engineering via covalent dye anchoring introduces abundant trap sites, facilitating rapid charge transfer and efficient spatial charge separation, which is critical for achieving high quantum efficiency in photocatalytic reactions.