Under the background of green and low-carbon transformation in the iron and steel industry, the proportion of pellets in the blast furnace charge is gradually increasing. Expanding the raw material options for pellets is a key common challenge faced by steel enterprises. For this purpose, the iron ore fines for sintering are used as raw material to study the effects of different particle size distributions of ball-milled iron ore fines on the properties of oxidized pellets. The results indicate that as the proportion of particles smaller than 0.074 mm increases, the specific surface area enlarges, enhancing the van der Waals forces between particles and continuously improving the compressive strength. However, the agglomeration effect of ultra-fine particles leads to a decrease in the bursting temperature. The compressive strength of preheated pellets initially increases and then stabilizes as particle size decreases. When the proportion of particles smaller than 0.074 mm is 75.45%, the compressive strength reaches 372.6 N/P. The compressive strength of roasted pellets overall shows a trend of "initially increasing, then decreasing, and increasing again". When the proportion of particles smaller than 0.074 mm was 46.24% and 60.30%, the strength reached the peak values of 2 062.4 N/P and 2 146.1 N/P respectively. Increasing the bentonite ratio can simultaneously enhance the drop strength, compressive strength, and bursting temperature of green pellets. When the ratio is 1%, the drop strength of green pellets is 16.6 times/(0.5 m), the compressive strength is 10.9 N/P, and the bursting temperature is 399 ℃. Under the conditions of a preheating temperature of 1 050 ℃, preheating time for 15 min, roasting temperature of 1 340 ℃, and roasting time for 15 min, the compressive strength of preheated and roasted pellets still increase with the bentonite ratio, reaching 367.2 N/P and 1 945.2 N/P respectively when the ratio is 1%. The findings of this study can provide references for steel enterprises to expand pellet raw material options for cost reduction and efficiency improvement.