The material is first fed into the feed hopper. A cup or bucket digs into the material and then is carried over a pulley or main sprocket, after which the material is discharged from the discharge chute. The empty bucket then continues this cycle back to boot.

Industrial bucket elevators come in a variety of sizes, weights, and shapes and use either continuous buckets or centrifugal buckets. Belts are usually made of metal, plastic, rubber, or natural fibers.

Centrifugal bucket elevators are more commonly used for bulk material transport. This bucket operates at high speed, discharging material from the bucket to the discharge chute by centrifugal force.

Continuous bucket elevators operate at a slower speed and contain equally spaced buckets. If the buckets are evenly spaced, gravity can successfully discharge the load on the inverted front of the previous bucket. This bucket then sends the material down the elevator to the discharge chute. It is used for soft, lightweight materials where minimal damage to the product or where ventilation of the material must be avoided.