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• A facile way to prepare poly (lactic acid)/cardanol composite with high elongation. • High impact resistant poly (lactic acid) composite with low cost was developed. • Dicumyl peroxide was innovatively used to reduce the consumption of plasticizer. Grafting reaction between poly (lactic acid) (PLA) and cardanol was initiated by dicumyl peroxide at different compositions, and the mechanical, thermal properties were characterized. In absence of dicumyl peroxide (DCP), the PLA/cardanol blends showed a typical plastic behavior with increasing cardanol content, i.e. decrement of tensile strength, accompanied by increment of elongation at break, while the notched Izod impact strength kept low level until the cardanol content reached 20 wt%. When DCP was introduced into the blends, only 15 wt% cardanol content was needed to improve the notched Izod impact strength significantly. According to the thermal behavior testing results, the grafting of cardanol onto PLA chains might take responsibility for the further improvement of impact strength with less cardanol content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]