Abstract To improve the stab resistance but decrease the weight of the stab-resistant clothing, coated stab-resistant composites have been prepared by coating aramid fabric with boron carbide (B4C)/epoxy resin. At first, B4C dispersion was prepared and a three-factor, four-level orthogonal experiment was designed to determine the optimal dispersion combination. It was shown that when the particle diameter is 2.5 μm, mass fraction is 49% and stirring temperature is 30 °C, the particle dispersion is the most uniform, with the highest relative sedimentation height. Then, the B4C dispersion was mixed with the expoxy resin and coated onto the aramid fabric, after which, stiffness, pulling-out, tearing and quasi-static puncture tests were conducted on the coated fabric. The results showed that the stab resistance increases with the decrease in particle diameter as well as the increase in particle mass fraction. For coated composites, the ultimate puncture load per weight reached 486 N/g, 428% higher than that of uncoated samples. The anti-stinging mechanism of the coated composites has also been investigated by analyzing the surface and fracture morphologies and the load-displacement curves.