In this paper, structural and dielectric properties of BaTiO3 ceramics obtained under extreme conditions were investigated. The temperature dependent dielectric investigations revealed that the phase transition temperatures of the BaTiO3 ceramics were raised as a function of residual strains associated to the nanostructuration, while structural characterizations showed a tetragonal arrangement at room temperature. From the frequency dependence analyses of the imaginary parts of dielectric permittivity, impedance and modulus function, three relaxation processes were identified. Two of them exhibit activation energies of 0.45 and 0.63 eV, and were attributed to single and double-ionization of oxygen vacancies. The whole set of results also indicated that the electrons resulting from the ionization of oxygen vacancies are trapped and do not contribute to the electrical conductivity, while the physical properties of the analyzed samples were enhanced by retaining a strained microstructure. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.