Post-earthquake utilities of liquid storage tanks do not need any over emphasis. Liquid storage tanks used in public water distribution system provide water for firefighting and also for drinking and household purposes. Tanks used in industry are equally critical as they contain hazardous liquids and their leakage may lead to catastrophic situation. Thus, seismic safety of liquid storage tanks, which are life line structures, is very important. The prime aim of the present work is to review the sloshing phenomenon studied by various researchers in the past. The study is broadly divided into two parts namely tanks without obstruction and tanks with obstruction and its effects on sloshing parameters. A brief review on sloshing problem in complex tank geometries in form of Intze, elliptical and conical tanks is also presented. The study also presents an overview and development of mathematical formulations to predict the sloshing parameters in form of sloshing frequency, convective mass excited and hydrodynamic pressure profiles which enable present structural engineers in designing earthquake-resistant storage structures. A brief review on modeling circular and rectangular liquid storage tanks using ANSYS software is also presented along with the assumptions and suitable element for modeling. The study also investigates the advantages and disadvantages of the different analysis methods available in the finite element program (ANSYS) to obtain the sloshing parameters. The study concludes that an optimum mesh size as detailed in the present study must be evaluated to determine slosh parameters. An arbitrary fine mesh results in a limited number of modes extracted from the finite element analysis and further gives inaccurate solutions. © 2021, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.