A facile thermal diffusion method has been employed to synthesize tapered ZnO:Cu nanorod arrays. The plain hexagonal ZnO nanorods gradually turned into round cylinder and then tapered nanorods during thermal treatment. The shape evolution was explained by the terraceledgekink model. Moreover, a small amount of copper has been incorporated into the nanorods during high temperature thermal treatment. Both X-ray photoelectron spectrum and photoluminescence results indicated that a number of oxygen vacancies exist in copper diffused samples. In addition, a catalyst free secondary growth was achieved on the tapered ZnO:Cu nanorod arrays. High resolution transmission electron microscope result showed that the tapered nanorods after secondary growth remained as a single crystal and the thinner section was epitaxially grown on the tip. (c) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.