Laser bending of tubes is a process in which laser-induced non-uniform thermal stress is used to deform tubes in a controlled way without hard tooling or external forces. For understanding the mechanism of laser tube bending, a thermal-mechanical finite element transient analysis is conducted to investigate the developments of stress and strain during laser bending process. The simulation of the moving laser beam during bending process is realized by using individual load arriving time and a special defined load time function. The mechanism of the laser tube bending is discussed based on the simulation result. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.