Abstract: In order to improve the seismic behavior of reinforced concrete frames, a new retrofitting method using pre-stressed steel strips to strengthen both the ends of the beams and columns as well as the core areas of the joints was presented. A low cyclic reversed loading was applied at the top of the reinforced concrete frame with single-span and three-story, scaled 1/2, to investigate the seismic behavior of the specimens strengthened with pre-stressed steel strips. Based on the test results, the seismic behavior such as the final failure models, hysteretic curves, skeleton curves, inter-story drift ratio, displacement ductility coefficient, energy dissipation capacity and stiffness degradation, etc, of the specimen were fully analyzed. Test results show that the hysteretic curves of the specimen retrofitted by pre-stressed steel strips is plump, indicating the energy dissipation behavior of the specimen is favorable. The elastic-plastic deformation capacity of the strengthened specimen is also perfect with the maximum inter-story drift ratio of 1/28.8.