In this work electrostatic solitary waves in a three component pair-plasma consisting of hot isothermal electrons (or negative fullerene ions), positrons (or positive fullerene ions), and stationary positive ions (say, dust particulates) are studied. Using reductive perturbation method, plasma fluid equations are reduced to a Korteweg–de Vries (KdV) equation. Considering the higher-order nonlinearity, a linear inhomogeneous equation is derived, and the stationary solutions of these coupled equations are achieved by applying the renormalization procedure of Kodama–Taniuti. It is observed that in the linear approximation and applying Fourier analysis, two electrostatic modes, namely, upper or optical and lower or acoustic modes, are present. However, the application of reductive perturbation technique confirms that only acoustic-electrostatic mode can propagate in such plasma as KdV soliton, the amplitude and width of which are studied regarding to plasma parameters σ (positron-to-electron temperature ratio) and δ (stationary cold ions-to-electron density ratio). It is also observed that the higher-order nonlinearity leads to deformation of the soliton structure from bell-shaped to W-shaped depending on the variation in values of the plasma parameters σ and δ. It is revealed that KdV-type solitary waves cannot propagate in three component pair-plasma when the pair-species temperature is equal.