Abstract: Four soil treatments with different TDS water (freshwater, 30, 100 and 250 g/L) were prepared and their soil-water characteristic curves of drying processes were obtained based on the measured soil water content and soil hydraulic pressure. The results showed that the specific water capacities of these treatments was similar in the whole drying process with partly different. However, compared with the freshwater and the water with TDS of 30 g/L, scenarios of the higher TDS (100 and 250 g/L) water possessed a remarkably weaker ability of the water retention. Further analysis indicated that four scenarios had different soil-water characteristic curves in the different TDS background. During the variation of soil suction of the four treatments, which ranged from 0 to 1 00 kPa water column, median pore size of soil dealt by 30 g/L-water, small pore size of soil dealt by 100 g/L-water and large pore size of soil dealt by 250 g/L-water diminished. RETC software and mathematical statistics method were adopted for getting the optimum model that described soil-water characteristic curves of the four dealt soils. For the treatments with freshwater, 30 g/L-water, 100 g/L-water and 250 g/L-water, the optimum models were van Genuchten-Mualem model, Dual-porosity-Mualem model, Log normal distribution-Mualem model and Dual-porosity-Mualem model, respectively, and Mualem model was the best one to describe the unsaturated hydraulic conductivity of the all soils. On the other hand, it's difficult to explain the inherent mechanism of the best model for different TDS. The research results are useful for analysis of soil water and salt transport under high-TDS condition in arid areas.