Co-doped SnO2 thin films are grown on sapphire (0001) substrates at 600 degrees C by the technique of dual-beam pulsed laser deposition. The prepared films show preferred orientation in the [100] direction of the rutile structure of SnO2. Nonequilibrium film growth process results in doping Co into SnO2 much above the thermal equilibrium limit. A Film with 3% of Co is ferromagnetic at room temperature with a remanent magnetization of similar to 26% and a coercivity of similar to 9.0 mT. As Co doping content x increases, the optical band gap absorption edge (E-o) of the Codoped SnO2 thin films initially shows a redshift at low x up to x=0.12 and then increases at the higher x, which are attributed to the sp-d exchange interactions and alloying effects, respectively. (C) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.