To easily generalize the maximum-principle-satisfying schemes for scalar conservation laws in [X. Zhang and C.-W. Shu, J. Comput. Phys., 229 (2010), pp. 3091–3120] to convection diffusion equations, we propose a nonconventional high order finite volume weighted essentially nonoscillatory (WENO) scheme which can be proved maximum-principle-satisfying. Two-dimensional extensions are straightforward. We also show that the same idea can be used to construct high order schemes preserving the maximum principle for two-dimensional incompressible Navier–Stokes equations in the vorticity stream-function formulation. Numerical tests for the fifth order WENO schemes are reported.