A facile hydrothermal method to synthesize tungsten carbide nanorods (WC-NRs) with mixture of zirconium oxide (ZrO2) and titanium dioxide (TiO2) materials for counter electrode (CE) in dye sensitized solar cell (DSSC) application is described. The synthesized materials were characterized by suitable analytical techniques such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area analysis and energy dispersive spectra analysis (EDS). The electrochemical behavior of WCNRs, WCNRs-ZrO2, WCNRs-TiO2 and WCNRs-ZrO2-TiO2 modified counter electrodes were studied using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) techniques. The DSSC assembled with the WCNRs-ZrO2, WCNRs-TiO2, WCNRs-ZrO2-TiO2 based counter electrode demonstrated an enhanced solar to electrical energy conversion efficiency (2.29%, 1.59%, 1.92%) compared to that of binder free WCNRs (0.59%), due to the increasing bonding strength of material to substrate. The enhanced solar energy conversion efficiency demonstrated by the WCNRs-ZrO2 makes it a promising candidate to Pt-free DSSC. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.