Micro-sized carbon material with a unique sponge-like morphology has been fabricated by hydrothermal method coordinating etching process. When evaluate its electrochemical properties in lithium ion batteries, the sponge-like carbon structure exhibits very high specific capacity (around 1175mAhg −1 after 140th cycle tested at the charge/discharge current density of 200mAg −1 ) and wonderful cyclability (about 117% retention is available when cycled back from very high current density of 800mAg −1 ) during the galvanostatic cycling, indicating it may be a promising candidate as anode material for Li-ion batteries.