The paper deals with the effects of an incident laser beam on electrodeposition of Ni-P alloys from dilute acetate solutions. The kinetics of separate reductions of Ni2+ and H2PO2- species were first investigated by linear sweep voltammetry, varying the hypophosphite concentration and the solution temperature: comparison of the kinetically limited current densities of the two reductions suggested that increasing temperature might reduce the significance of P codeposition. This tendency was confirmed by deposition runs carried out at controlled current. Deposition performance was discussed in terms of faradaic yield and deposit properties, namely P content together with the aspect and the structure of the alloys. Use of a continuous or pulsed laser beam was shown to reduce the P content in the deposit at high current densities; in some cases, amorphous structures were replaced by more crystalline forms with assistance of a laser beam.