Adhesion strength is a crucial factor for the performance and reliability of metallic patterns on insulator substrates. In this study, we present an efficient technique for selective metallization of alumina ceramic with high adhesion strength by using nanosecond laser modification and electroless copper plating. Specifically, a 355 nm Nd:YVO4 ultraviolet (UV) laser was employed not only to decompose palladium chloride film locally for catalyzing the electroless reaction, but also to modify the ceramic surface directly using its high fluence. An orthogonal experiment was undertaken to study the effects of processing parameters including laser fluence, scanning speed and scanning line interval on adhesion strength. The adhesion strength was measured by pulling a metallic wire soldered into the copper coating perpendicular to the substrate using a pull tester. The results have shown that a strong adhesion between the copper coating and the alumina ceramic, higher than the tensile strength of tin-lead solder was obtained. Surface and interface characteristics were investigated to understand that, whose results have shown that the high-aspect-ratio microstructures formed by the laser modification is the major reason for the improvement of adhesion. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.