Abstract: Steel portal frames with tapered beams and (or) columns with thin web have been widely used, often suffered local buckling during static loadings and earthquake loadings. In order to investigate the seismic performance of H-section tapered columns, seven H-section steel short columns with various dimensions have been tested under a cyclic loading first. The local buckling and the damage phenomena of the specimens have been analyzed. From the test results, hysteretic curves, load-displacement sketch curves have been obtained and discussed. Based on ANSYS, the numerical analysis mode has been established and the whole process has been analyzed, in which the effects of local imperfections of the web, yielding, residual stress and large deflections are considered. According to the results from the numerical analysis and experiment, the failure mode, hysteretic curves and ultimate load have been discussed. It is found that the numerical analysis can generate comparable results to the experiment.