The present work inspects the entropy generation on radiative heat transfer in the flow of variable thermal conductivity optically thin viscous Cu–water nanofluid with an external magnetic field through a parallel isothermal plate channel. Our approach uses the power series from the governing non-linear differential equations for small values of thermal conductivity variation parameter which are then analysed by various generalizations of Hermite- Padé approximation method. The influences of the pertinent flow parameters on velocity, temperature, thermal conductivity criticality conditions and entropy generation are discussed quantitatively both numerically and graphically. A stability analysis has been performed for the rate of heat transfer which signifies that the lower solution branch is stable and physically acceptable, whereas the upper solution branch is unstable