It is well known that the strength and the fatigue life of welded steel components are affected extensively by welding residual stresses distributed around their weldments under not only monotonic but also cyclic loads. The externally applied loads are to be superimposed with the welding residual stresses, so that unexpected deformations and failures of the components might occur. These residual stresses are not kept constant, but relaxed or redistributed during in service. Under monotonic loads the relaxation takes place when the sum of external and welding residual stress exceeds locally the yield stress of material used. By the way, it is shown that under cyclic loads the welding residual stress is considerably relieved by the first or the early cycles of loads, and then gradually relaxed with increasing loading cycles. Although many investigations in this field have been carried out, the phenomenon and mechanism of the stress relaxation are still not clear, and there are few comprehensive models to predict amount of relaxed welding residual stress. In this study, the characteristics of the welding residual stress relaxation under monotonic and cyclic loads were investigated, and a model to predict quantitatively amount of welding residual stress relaxation was proposed.