We demonstrated in this paper a simple and easy method for the preparation of dendritic nickel crystals in an external magnetic field in boiling ethylene glycol (EG) solution. The structural features and morphology of the sample were investigated using powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The values of saturation magnetization (M-s) and coercivity (H-e) of the dendritic crystals characterized by using a vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) are 170.3 emu g(-1) and 50.7 Oe, respectively. It was clear that the external magnetic field was the most important factor for controlling the morphology of the product. (C) 2007 Published by Elsevier Ltd.