This article describes a comparative study of surfaces of lead zirconate titanate ceramic and carbon fiber reinforced polymer composite materials. In the present study, abrasive water jet machining technique is used to machine ceramic and composite materials. Major process parameters namely stand-off distance, water pressure and traverse speed are considered. The experiments are designed by using response surface methodology. After machining, surface roughness of the machined samples is measured by surface roughness tester. The significance and influence of process parameters are studied by performing analysis of variance. It is observed that water pressure, stand-off distance and traverse speed are significant parameters in machining of lead zirconate titanate ceramic and water pressure and traverse speed are significant parameters in machining of carbon fiber reinforced polymer composite material. It is observed that increase in water pressure and decrease in stand-off distance decreases surface roughness in machining of ceramic material. The surface roughness is reduced from 3.189 to 2.010 μm. Increase in water pressure and decrease in traverse speed results in decrease in surface roughness in machining of composite material. The surface roughness varies between 2.392 and 3.998 μm. Further, the machined surfaces of ceramic and composite materials are examined by using scanning electron microscope to study the microscopic features of the machined surfaces. It is observed that machined surfaces of ceramic and composite material reveal three distinct regions of surface roughness. © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.