Poly[6,6′‐(1‐methylethylidene)bis(3,4‐dihydro‐3‐2H‐1,3‐hexylbenzoxazine)] (PB‐hda)‐silica nanocomposites were synthesized with perhydropolysilazane (PHPS) and PB‐hda by ring opening polymerization in one step. Both high transparency and good water vapor barrier property (WVP) are required to be improved in the field of packing and electronic materials, such as OLED, solar cell, and electronic paper. PB‐hda has shown high toughness and high thermal stability. However, it became dark brown and showed a reduction of WVP with increasing curing temperature, which make it difficult to be applied to packing and electronic materials. In this study, we aim to improve transparency and WVP by addition of PHPS into PB‐hda matrix. It was found that nanocomposites showed the improvement of WVP and transparency owing to SiOC linkages between PB‐hda and PHPS. In particular, a nanocomposite with 1 wt % of silica showed the most significant improvement in terms of transparency and the WVP. These properties were found to be influenced by the thickness of the combined polymer‐silica layers that formed around the silica particles; these layers were thickest in the 1 wt % sample. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2016, 133, 44238.