Tungsten is the material of choice for the first wall of magnetically constrained thermonuclear fusion reactors. The retention and effective removal of hydrogen isotopes in tungsten-based materials is of great significance for the damage assessment of materials under the conditions of fusion reactors and the placement of hydrogen isotope fuels. In order to eliminate the influence of the geometrical factors of bulk tungsten in the study of hydrogen isotope retention and effective removal, the work of hydrogen isotope retention and effective removal was carried out in this work, using thermal desorption and isotope exchange. By using these two methods, the deuterium retained in powder tungsten has been removed, and the residual amount, desorption characteristic peak and solid solubility of the tungsten powder in the two methods were obtained. The results show that the two removal methods have obvious removal effects on the three types of lanthanum residing in tungsten powder; the time and conditions for the two removal methods to reach equilibrium are different; the isotope exchange is more effective than the thermal desorption. However, its operation is more difficult, and the thermal desorption method has a greater advantage.