A low-temperature, flexible and facile non-thermal plasma method was used to synthesize the highly efficient nano-MoS 2 -based catalysts under ambient conditions. • Nano-MoS 2 -based catalysts were synthesized via non-thermal plasma approach. • The enhancement is attributable to the thin and short MoS 2 slabs. • The performance of the plasma-prepared MoS 2 -based catalyst was stable in the 200 h runs. • Directly plasma-prepared MoS 2 possessed the best behavior for higher alcohol synthesis. High-performance nano-MoS 2 -based catalysts for higher alcohol synthesis (HAS) through CO hydrogenation were synthesized using non-thermal plasma under ambient conditions. The as-synthesized catalysts were carefully characterized using XRD, BET, H 2 -TPD/TPR, CO-TPD, in-situ CO adsorption DRIFTS, TEM, XPS, ICP, elemental analysis, and CO-TPSR techniques. The study results suggest that the non-thermal plasma approach not only achieves a large number of the small nano-MoS 2 particles, but also decreases the synthesis time, compared to the conventional thermal methods. This flexible and facile approach can give the thinner and shorter MoS 2 slabs, expose more coordinatively unsaturated sites, and increase the number of active centers for alcohols formation. Therefore, the non-thermal plasma-synthesized MoS 2 -based catalysts exhibited the excellent catalytic performances for HAS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]