As a material derived from cellulose, which is abundant in nature, carboxymethyl cellulose
(CMC) has been used as an ingredient to synthesize hydrogels for various applications. The
introduction of self-healing properties in CMC hydrogels will expand their service life and
scope of application. We report a facile way to fabricate CMC hydrogels with self-healing
behaviour. The self-healing CMC hydrogel is achieved by acidifying the CMC paste in citric
acid solution. The CMC hydrogel can autonomously self-heal without any external stimulus
under ambient temperature, and the healed hydrogels can bear the stretching as demonstrated
by macroscopic observation. The hydrogel with 2.5 MPa compressive strength
exhibits 80% of healing efficiency. With these superior properties, the developed CMC
hydrogel holds great potential for applications in biomedical and industry fields.