Highly loaded PtRu/C catalyst with high activity toward methanol electrooxidation was synthesized via a modified polyol process. XRD patterns indicated that the prepared catalyst was highly alloyed and TEM results showed that the metal nanoparticles were small and uniformly distributed on the carbon support despite the high metal loading. EDX results suggested that the two metals distributed uniformly in the catalyst. Electrochemical characterization and single cell test jointly showed that the prepared 40-20 wt.%PtRu/C catalyst possessed high activity toward methanol electrooxidation. (c) 2006 Published by Elsevier Ltd.