Abstract: Based on catastrophe theory and monitoring data, a time prediction model of landslides is established, in which the rheological behaviors of medium on the sliding surface are taken into account and the catastrophe of a state variable is applied to reflect the instability of landslides. It is found that the catastrophe properties of landslides are controlled by the stiffness ratio of mediums of a shear section to those of rheology section on the sliding surface. According to the bifurcation set of cusp catastrophe theory, the formulae to predict occurrence time of landslides is derived, which can be applied to forecast landslides. Moreover, the formulae of sliding velocity are obtained by using energy transformation theory. Finally, the present model is applied to predict occurrence time of certain landslide.