Abstract: To replace the traditional clay-brick structure and adapt to the requirements for the development of energy-saving buildings, the reinforcement concrete (RC) shear wall structure with a single layer of web reinforcement and inclined steel bars was proposed. Compared with conventional RC shear wall structures with double layers of web reinforcement, it has the advantages of smaller wall thickness, simpler construction details and lower cost. The inclined steel bars can prevent base sliding so that the shear wall has higher anti-shearing and energy dissipation capacity. Cyclic loading tests on four low-rise RC shear walls with rectangle cross section were carried out. The inclined steel bars arrangement and axial force ratio were taken as the major test variables. Based on the experimental research, the failure characteristics, hysteresis properties, load-carrying capacity, ductility, stiffness and energy dissipation of each specimen were analyzed. The seismic performance of RC shear walls with inclined steel bars was compared with that of RC shear walls without the inclined steel bars. Calculative formulas for the load-carrying capacity of low-rise RC shear walls with single web reinforcement and inclined steel bars were also established. The research results indicate that the seismic performance of low-rise RC shear walls with inclined steel bars is better than that of shear walls without the inclined steel bars. So it is able to better satisfy the requirements of seismic design for multistory residential buildings.