Paper based energy devices, such as paper based fuel cells, have gained immense popularity in the recent past, because of their easy operation, disposability, availability, low cost, and biodegradability. these energy conversion devices are free of any metering mechanisms, because of the capillary action and absorption property of paper. since paper has fairly good liquid retention ability, the storage of reagents (fuel/oxidant) is taken care of by the paper itself. in addition to this, various paper- based disposable and point-of-care (poc) diagnostic devices, such as, pregnancy detection kits, dengue detection kits, glucometers, are employed widely in the healthcare sector. these devices provide rapid diagnosis and analysis, once the sample (liquid) is discharged onto them. usually, these poc devices have a paper test strip, which receives the sample and the results are then displayed on a small led screen. for example, an e.p.t and clearblue digital pregnancy test kit, can reveal the test results (pregnant/not pregnant), and the number of weeks of pregnancy on the led display. the functioning of these devices require power in milli-nano watt ranges for a short time, and therefore these are often referred as micro-nano (mns) devices. batteries are presently being used to power them. keeping in view of the increasing energy demands, the use of batteries for single and short-time operation might not be economical for mns in the long run. to this end, paper based fuel cells, which are environmentally benign, can be an apposite alternative to batteries to power mns at low-cost. these paper based fuel cells provide sufficient power density required by the poc devices with minimal consumption of fuel and oxidant. recently, several paper based fuel cells have been reported, including microbial fuel cells. these fuel cells have reported power densities of ~ 4.4 mw/cm2, but the use of pt and au at electrodes, limits their economic feasibility. the functioning of microbial fuel cells requires specific environment maintenance of the specimen (bacteria). this again limits the practical application of these fuel cells for portable consumer devices. in our work, we have developed a t-shaped paper based portable methanol fuel cells, where methanol is the fuel and kmno4 is the oxidant. 4m naoh is mixed with different concentrations of methanol, namely, 2m, 4m, 6m, to form the anolyte and 4m h¬2so4 is mixed with 1m kmno4¬, to form the catholyte. the paper cell consists of two l-shaped paper strips which are physically separated, but are conjoined by proton conducting polyacryl amide (pam) gel in between. carbon cloth serves as the electrodes and are placed on each paper strip so that they are in contact with the pam gel from both the sides. instead of using expensive noble metals, such as, pt, au, pd etc., a composite of hydrothermally synthesized, ni¬co2o4@n-rgo (nickel cobaltite on nitrogen doped reduced graphene oxide), serves as the catalyst for anode and cathode. the maximum power and current densities attained are 4.67 mw/cm2 and 15.6 ma/cm2, respectively, with 0.25 ml each of anolyte and catholyte. the paper cell delivers current for about 25 minutes, and regenerates the current density, upon fresh discharge of reagents. in order to demonstrate its application, a stack of two cells are connected in series and a 3mm led is connected as the load to the stack. the led is illuminated successfully with this stack and continued to glow for more than 30 minutes. these findings clearly implicate that this paper cell can provide sufficient power for mns/poc devices cost-effectively. they can be potential on-board energy source for poc and disposable diagnostic devices. miniaturized versions of these cells can be integrated with portable devices.