In this work, a polyaniline coated hierarchical porous carbon (HPC) composite (PANI@HPC) is developed using a vapor deposition polymerization technique. The as synthesized composite is applied as the supercapacitor electrode material, and presents a high specific capacitance of 531 F g(-1) at current density of 0.5 A g(-1) and superior cycling stability of 96.1% (after 10,000 charge discharge cycles at current density of 10 A g(-1)). This can be attributed to the maximized synergistic effect of PANI and HPC. Furthermore, an aqueous symmetric supercapacitor device based on PANI@HPC is fabricated, demonstrating a high specific energy of 17.3 Wh kg(-1). (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.