A simple direct electrochemical approach from materials-science point of view is presented for preparing tin oxide nanoparticles. Advanced structural, chemical, optical and morphological characterizations are employed for analysis. The electrode is composed of -12 nm spherical tin oxide nanocrystallites, which showed current density of 5.472 mA cm(-2) with nearly 1% power conversion efficiency. The need for better fundamental understanding of the characteristics for improving tin oxide-based dye-sensitized solar cells is emphasized.