The paper investigates the influence of lateral restraint on the buckling behaviour of plate under non-uniform compression. The unloaded edges are assumed to be partially restrained against translation in the plane of the plate and the distributions of the resulting forces acting on the plate are shown. The stability analysis is done numerically using the Galerkin method and various strategies the economize the numerical implementation are presented. Results are obtained showing the variation of the buckling load, from free edge translation to fully restrained, with unloaded edges simply supported, clamped and partially restrained against rotation for various plate aspect ratios and stress gradient coefficients. An apparent decrease in the buckling load is observed due to these destabilizing forces acting in the plate and changes in the buckling modes are observed by increasing the intensity of the lateral restraint. A comparison is made between the budding loads predicted from various formulas in stability standards based on free edge translation and the values derived from the present investigation. A difference of about 34% in the predicted buckling load and different buckling mode were found.