We prepared nickel-samaria-doped-ceria cermet anodes for intermediate temperature solid oxide fuel cells, by using two different background sputtering gases. One is a reactive mixture gas of pure argon and oxygen (Ar/O2:80/20), and other is non-reactive pure argon gas. For all cells, a 150 mu m fully stabilized scandia-stabilized-zirconia pellet was used as an electrolyte support. Lanthanum strontium manganite ink was screen-printed on the electrolyte support to act as a cathode. Initial results showed that the anodes produced by non-reactive background sputtering gas, outperformed the anodes produced by reactive mixture background gas in all categories of performance and also showed lesser agglomeration with time. (C) 2016 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.