The effects of heavy Li doping on lattice spacings, out-of-plane, and in-plane domain sizes of roomtemperature epitaxial LixNi1-xO (0 <= x <= 0.48) thin films on ultra-smooth sapphire (0 0 0 1) substrates were investigated. The pseudocubic-on-hexagonal epitaxial relationship between the LixNi1-xO epitaxial thin films and the sapphire substrates was verified. The (1 1 1) lattice spacing of the film was larger than the (1 1 1) lattice spacing of the film regardless of the Li content. It indicated that all the crystal structures deviated from the ideal cubic structure and elongated along the [1 1 1] out-of-plane growth direction. The crystal domain sizes of LixNi1-xO thin films in the in-plane direction were found to be very similar, while the out-of-plane domain size increased with a Li content up to 48 mol%. It suggested that the out-of-plane growth can be improved by heavy Li doping. Moreover, the crystal quality of the films was compared with that grown by high temperature pulse laser deposition in view of the domain size information. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.