A process for removing water from an oxidative esterification reactor includes (a) conducting an oxidative esterification reaction in a reactor; (b) removing a crude product stream from the reactor; (c) passing a first portion of the crude product stream directly to a product recovery zone; (d) introducing a second portion of the crude product stream to a distillation column to generate a column overheads stream and a column bottoms stream; (e) passing at least a portion of the columns bottoms stream to the product recovery zone; and (f) recycling a recycle stream comprising at least a portion of the overheads stream to the reactor; wherein the recycle stream contains less than 1 weight percent (wt %) water based on the total weight of the recycle stream, wherein the weight ratio of the first portion to the second portion is at least 1:10, and wherein the amount of the recycle stream recycled to the reactor is such that the reactor contains less than or equal to 2.5 wt % water, based on the weight of the reactor contents.