Via electroless metal deposition, we have successfully synthesized micrometer scale silver disks with perfectly hexagonal structure on Si-incorporated diamond-like carbon (Si-DLC) films and discussed their growth mechanism in terms of self-assembled localized microscopic electrochemical cell model and diffusion-limited aggregation process. The self-assembled electrochemical reaction automatically ceases by exhausting all the Si nanocrystalline clusters on the surface of the amorphous carbon matrix. The growth of silver disks on Si-DLC films follows Volmer-Weber growth mechanism and the rate of nucleation is slow. The disks have a fcc crystal structure with (I 1 1) stacking faults lying parallel to the (1 1 1) surface and extending across entire disk. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.