In this paper, the switching stabilisation problem of second-order switched linear systems is studied. By extending the best case switching signal (BCSS) criteria for second-order switched linear systems with two subsystems to the general case with any finite number of subsystems, necessary and sufficient conditions for regional stabilisability of second-order switched linear systems with any finite number of subsystems are proposed in this paper. The main idea of this paper is to divide all the subsystems in a region into two groups based on their trajectory directions in that region. By comparing pairwise, the most "stable" subsystem for each group in a region can be determined and the BCSS analysis among all the subsystems in that region is reduced to the BCSS analysis between the two most "stable" subsystems in that region. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.