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N-doped porous carbon nanosheets (N-CNS) were prepared from coal tar pitch with the addition of urea and KOH activation. In the synthesis route, urea plays an important role in constructing the 2D sheet-like structure, which serves as a nitrogen source, chemical blowing agent and the in-situ formation of g-C 3 N 4 self-degraded template. At a low activation temperature (600 °C), the as-prepared N-doped porous carbon nanosheets possess high nitrogen content (7.06 at. %) and high specific surface area (1181 m 2  g −1 ), which offers remarkable capacitive performances due to the unique architecture and pseudocapacitance contribution of the N doping. The N-CNS exhibits high capacitive performance (210 F g −1 at 0.1 A g −1 ), and an excellent cycling stability. Additionally, the assembled symmetric supercapacitor displays an energy density of 7.15 Wh kg −1 , and the capacitance retention remains 91.2% after 5000 cycles at 1 A g −1 . The facile and low-cost route to massively prepare N-doped porous carbon nanosheets from coal tar pitch would be favorable to the applications of carbon materials for high performance supercapacitors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]