Abstract Motivated by the recent investigations of several authors, in this paper, we derive several new expansion formulas involving a generalized Hurwitz-Lerch zeta function introduced and studied recently by Srivastava et al . (Integral Transforms Spec. Funct. 22:487-506, 2011). These expansions are obtained by using some fractional calculus theorems such as the generalized Leibniz rules for the fractional derivatives and the Taylor-like expansions in terms of different functions. Several (known or new) special cases are also considered. MSC: 11M25, 11M35, 26A33, 33C05, 33C60.