Field emission behavior of diamond-like carbon (DLC) and phosphorus-doped DLC (p-DLC) films prepared by electrochemical deposition process was comparatively investigated. It was shown phosphorus incorporation in the DLC film could lower the turn on field from 12 to 9.5 V/mu m and increase the current density from 12.6 to 45.7 mu A/mm(2) under high electric field. And better field emission performance of p-DLC films would be mainly attributed to the influence of the surface morphology and the changes of microstructure due to the phosphorus incorporation. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.