Adding variety of nanoparticles to the base fluid is current technique in order to boost the thermal performance of conventional fluids and mononanofluids. The forthright intention of the present investigation is to analyze numerically the up-to-date progress in flow and heat transport nature of magnetohydrodynamic, radiative Newtonian fluid, water-based Al2O3 nanofluid, water-based graphene nanofluid and water based Al2O3 + graphene hybrid nanofluid due to convectively heated stretching sheet. The flow equations are transformed by applying appropriate transformations into a pair of self-similarity equations. Further similarity equivalences are numerically solved through Runge–Kutta based shooting method. Graphs and tables are structured to analyze the behavior of sundry influential variables. From this study it is found that rate of heat transfer for Graphene + water is 2.921934, Al2O3 + H2O + Graphene is 2.250658 and Al2O3 + H2O is 3.260554. From this we conclude that water based Al2O3 + graphene hybrid nanofluid can be opted for cooling performance. Water based Al2O3 nanofluid significantly enhance convection heat transfer performance over a stretching sheet. Friction at the wall for Graphene + water is (− 1.719525), Al2O3 + H2O + Graphene is (− 2.256614) and Al2O3 + H2O is (− 1.959539). From this we conclude that water based Al2O3 + graphene hybrid nanofluid shows lower wall friction rate compared to other two mixture compositions.