In this study, very simple periodic cathodic vacuum arc deposition was conducted to prepare multilayered structures of diamond-like carbon films with reduced surface roughness and enhanced mechanical properties compared to conventional unfiltered single-layered films. The roughness of single-layered diamond-like carbon films significantly increased from 23 to 104 nm with increasing thickness from 100 to 800 nm due to the droplet formation in plasma atmosphere. By introducing periodic deposition, the roughness of the multilayered structures with a thickness of 400 nm was reduced from 75 to 37 nm, associated with a much smaller number of surface particles. The hardness of the multilayered structures was enhanced from 27 to 34 GPa, and the interface adhesion was increased from 2.73 to 3.63 J/m(2). The single- and multilayered films showed a similar amorphous structure with slightly varied ID/IG ratios from 0.9 to 0.6. The periodic deposition process was the dominant factor for the reduced roughness and enhanced mechanical properties of the unfiltered films. (C) 2012 The Electrochemical Society. [DOI: 10.1149/2.014206jes] All rights reserved.