Facile hydrothermal synthesis of nanoplate and mulberry-like porous shape of CuO nanostructures was developed as anode materials for application in lithium ion batteries. The powder X-ray diffraction patterns of both the samples were indexed well to a pure monoclinic phase of CuO with no impurities. The CuO sample synthesized at different pH and reaction temperature exhibited nanoplate with average width and length of similar to 150-300 nm and similar to 300-700 nm and mulberry-like porous shape of CuO with average length of similar to 300-400 nm. Electrochemical tests show that the lithium storage performances of both the nanoplate and mulberry-like samples are influenced more closely to its structural aspects than their morphology and size factors. The CuO nanoplate electrode exhibits high reversible charge capacity of 279.3 mAh g(-1) at 1.0C after 70 cycles, and a capacity of 150.2 mAh g(-1) even at high current rate of 4.0C during rate test, whereas the mulberry-like porous shape of CuO anode delivers only 131.4 mAh g(-1) at 1.0C after 70 cycles and 121.7 mAh g(-1) at 4.0C. It is believed that the nanoplate type architecture is very favorable to accommodate the volume expansion/contraction and aggregation of particles during the cyclic process. In contrast, the mulberry-like porous morphology could not preserve the integrity of the structure and completely disintegrated into nanoparticles during Li+ ion insertion/deinsertion due to the loose contact between the particles. (c) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.