Abstract: Modern airborne active phased array fire-control radar calls for increasingly high data process capability, the radar software has become increasingly complicated. Radar system also demand more and more requirement on software function verificationand algorithm improvement, therefore , it is necessary to establish the a distributed hardware-in-the-loop simulation system whichcan hold the whole software lifecycle to satisfy the requirement of airborne phased array fire-control radar software development. Inthis paper, the structure and operating process of the simulation system are discussed. The method to simulate the tracks of targetand carrier, as well as radar echo is proposed . The related simulation method and software system has been validated successfullyin the practical software system of airborne phased-array fire control radar.