Abstract In this paper, a brief introduction of polyol synthesis with respect to chemical reduction of metal ions and kinetic behavior of crystal growth were provided. The active facet of metal nanoparticles could be preferentially exposed by modifying the growth kinetics of crystal facets in the liquid solution. Then the progress in the preparation of Co, Ni and CoNi nanoparticles with different morphologies in polyol were summarized to show its superiority in the morphology-controlled synthesis of metal nanoparticles. The effective fabrication of metal nanoparticles with desired shapes not only altered their catalytic behaviors in several catalytic reactions, but also bridged the materials gap between the single crystals and the practical catalysts, intensifying the profound understanding of the structure-reactivity relationship. Finally, the importance and the direction of morphology-controlled synthesis of metallic nanoparticles in polyol were stressed.
