Abstract: To study the axial compression stability behavior of steel tubular members with semi-rigid connections in transmission towers, the axial compression test of 60 steel tubular members was firstly conducted, in which the failure mode was analyzed and the stability bearing capacity was compared with calculated results of existing design codes. The finite element (FE) model of steel tubular members with semi-rigid connections was established. After the validation with experimental results, the parametric analysis was carried out, and the investigated are the effect of initial rotational stiffness, diameter-thickness ratio, yield strength and initial imperfection on the stability coefficient-slenderness ratio curve. One stability design formula for steel tubular members with semi-rigid connections was proposed upon FE analysis results. The results show that: the experimental stability bearing capacity of steel tubular members with semi-rigid connections is larger than that with pinned connections, in which the minimum relative error is 5.6% in all experiment cases. The stability bearing capacity calculated by Chinese and American existing design codes exhibits overall conservatism, in which the calculated results are respectively 0.78 and 0.89 times of experimental results. The main factors which affect the stability bearing capacity of steel tubular members with semi-rigid connections are the slenderness ratio, initial rotational stiffness and, boundary condition. The formula proposed could accurately predict the stability coefficient with good applicability, which can provide a reference for actual associated engineering.