A nanocomposite dry adhesive. The nanocomposite dry adhesive includes a substrate; and an array of vertically aligned single-walled carbon nanotubes or vertically aligned multi-walled carbon nanotubes on the substrate, wherein the nanocomposite dry adhesive utilizes the array of single-walled carbon nanotubes or multi-walled carbon nanotubes as synthesized, the as synthesized single-walled carbon nanotubes being substantially free of randomly entangled nanotube segments on top of the vertically aligned single-walled carbon nanotubes, the as synthesized multi-walled carbon nanotubes having randomly entangled nanotube segments on top of the vertically aligned multi-walled carbon nanotubes; wherein the dry adhesive has a normal adhesion strength of at least about 5 N·cm−2, and a shear adhesion strength of at least about 13 N·cm−2. Methods of making a nanocomposite dry adhesive are also described.