Graphical AbstractPorous carbons were prepared from enteromorpha overrunning in China Sea with ZnCl 2 as active reagent. The prepared porous carbon with a specific surface area of 1651 m 2 /g exhibited a specific capacitance of 206 F/g and capacity retention of 93% even after 5000 cycles, indicating good electrochemical properties and promising utilization future of enteromorpha as electrode materials for supercapacitors.Porous carbons were prepared from enteromorpha overrunning in China Sea with ZnCl 2 as active agent. The obtained porous carbons were used as electrode materials to make supercapacitors. In order to make enteromorpha based supercapacitors with high performance, the effects of preparation parameters including impregnation weight ratio of ZnCl 2 to enteromorpha, activation time and temperature on pore structure and electrochemical performances of enteromorpha based porous carbons (EBPCs) were investigated. The specific area and porous structure were characterized by nitrogen adsorption. Galvanostatic charge-discharge and cyclic voltammetry analysis were used to investigate the electrochemical properties of EBPCs. The results show that activation temperature of 700 °C, the impregnation weight ratio of 2/1 and activation time of 1.5 h are the optimal preparation parameters. The prepared EBPC with a specific surface area of 1651 m 2 /g exhibited a specific capacitance of 206 F/g and capacity retention of 93 % even after 5000 cycles, showing excellent electrochemical properties of EBPC and good utilization future of enteromorpha. the pseudocapacitance contribution is little, and specific capacitance derives mainly from electric double layer capacitance 34 . In addition, the CV curve of H700-0-1.5 has a larger area than those of H800-0-1.5 and H600-0-1.5, indicating the highest specific capacitance, which can also be confirmed by galvanostatic charge-discharge curves in Fig. 7(a).