A physical sputtering method was adopted to prepare graphene supported highly dispersed and uniform sized Ru NPs without using any solutions, surfactants and reductants. The Ru/G-spu exhibited excellent catalytic performance for HER and hydrolytic dehydrogenation of NaBH4. Especially for HER in alkaline media, it performed superior electrocatalytic activity over Pt/C. The superior catalytic performance can be attributed to the high exposed surface area and dispersion of Ru NPs on graphene with the open 2D layer structure, which demonstrates the physical sputtering method is a facile and efficient technique to prepare graphene supported metal NPs with excellent structure and catalytic properties. (C) 2019 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.