Interfacial solar steam generation offers a promising and cost‐effective way for saline water desalination. However, salt accumulation and deposition on photothermal materials during saline and brine evaporation is detrimental to the stability and sustainability of solar evaporation. Although several antisalt strategies are developed, it is difficult to simultaneously achieve high evaporation rates (>2.0 kg m−2 h−1) and energy efficiencies. In this study, a self‐rotating photothermal evaporator with dual evaporation zones (i.e., high‐temperature and low‐temperature evaporation zones) is developed. This photothermal evaporator is sensitive to weight imbalance (<15 mg) thus is able to quickly respond to salt accumulation by rotation to refresh the evaporation surface, while the dual evaporation zones optimize the energy nexus during solar evaporation, simultaneously realizing excellent salt‐resistant performance and high evaporation rate (2.6 kg m−2 h−1), which can significantly contribute to the real‐world application of solar steam generation technology.

Improving evaporation rate is extremely important to promote the application of solar steam generation in clean water production through seawater desalination. However, the theoretical evaporation rate limit of a normal two-dimensional (2D) photothermal evaporator is only about 1.46 kg m–2 h–1. While 3D evaporators can break the limit, they require much more raw materials. In this work, an effective approach for achieving high-yield solar steam generation via the synergy of 2D nanostructure-embedded all-in-one hybrid hydrogel evaporator and surface patterning is reported. This improved surface-patterned evaporator is able to simultaneously lower the enthalpy of vaporization and induce the Marangoni effect near the evaporation surface, thus delivering a high evaporation rate of 3.62 kg m–2 h–1, which is more than twice the theoretical limit of the normal 2D photothermal evaporator. This hybrid hydrogel offers a cost-effective and energy-efficient pathway to mitigate clean water shortages.

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Ni1Co3@PDA nanosheets were utilized as photothermal materials in a kerosene lamp-like evaporator for solar steam generation. A high evaporation rate of 2.42 kg m−2 h−1 with a corresponding energy efficiency beyond the theoretical limit was achieved.

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