A new type of earthquake-resisting element that consists of a steel plate shear wall with slits is introduced. The infi ll steel plate is divided into a series of vertical fl exural links with vertical links. The steel plate shear walls absorb energy by means of in-plane bending deformation of the fl exural links and the energy dissipation capacity of the plastic hinges formed at both ends of the fl exural links when under lateral loads. In this paper, fi nite element analysis and experimental studies at low cyclic loadings were conducted on specimens with steel plate shear walls with multilayer slits. The eff ects caused by varied slit pattern in terms of slit design parameters on lateral stiff ness, ultimate bearing capacity and hysteretic behavior of the shear walls were analyzed. Results showed that the failure mode of steel plate shear walls with a single-layer slit was more likely to be out-of-plane buckling of the fl exural links. As a result, the lateral stiff ness and the ultimate bearing capacity were relatively lower when the precondition of the total height of the vertical slits remained the same. Diff erently, the failure mode of steel plate shear walls with multilayer slits was prone to global buckling of the infi ll steel plates; more obvious tensile fi elds provided evidence to the fact of higher lateral stiff ness and excellent ultimate bearing capacity. It was also concluded that multilayer specimens exhibited better energy dissipation capacity compared with single-layer plate shear walls.