Visible light-regulated thermal catalytic selectivity induced by nonthermal effects over CuNi/CeO2

•CuNi/CeO2 exhibits different product selectivities in thermal and photothermal catalytic reactions.•The nonthermal effect of visible light helps to change the chemical reaction pathway.•The plasmon effect of Cu generates hot electrons to transfer to Ni for CO2 further hydrogenation reaction.•Visible light facilitated the splitting of H2 which is beneficial to the increase of adsorption sites.