In order to reinforce the nanostructure and suppress the shrinkage of the nanopores of polyethylene (PE)-based silica aerogels (PE-b-Si) during the gelation and supercritical drying process, graphene nanoplatelets (GnP) is integrated into the PE-based silica solution prior to gelation during the sol-gel polymerization step. A small amount of GnP (0-2wt%) strengthens the gel network prior to drying acting as an effective anti-shrinkage nanofiller. The influences of GnP content on the sol–gel process, structure, and physical properties of PE-b-Si aerogel have been investigated in this study. It was found that GnP can significantly contribute to the uniform gelation of the PE-b-Si solution and reduce both the gelation and drying shrinkage while enhancing the mechanical properties dramatically. A mechanism of inhibiting shrinkage is proposed and presented here. 3-D bonded PE-b-Si/GnP aerogel achieves synergistic strengthening which exhibits a fully structural deformations and compressive mechanical strength (25 MPa at a compressive strain of 90%) compared to the pure PE-based silica aerogel (~10 MPa at one compression cycle in a same range of density) with minimal structural shrinkage ever reported for PE-based silica aerogel. Owing to the combination of excellent mechanical, and thermal insulation and dielectrical properties, the PE-b-Si/GnP are expected to be used in many different applications. Such an ordered architecture opens the door to fabricate the new 3-D multifunctional and mechanically durable nanoporous cellular aerogels for emerging applications, which include thermal insulation products, capacitors, and strong nano-devices.