Abstract: A symplectic wave-based method is proposed for the forced vibration analysis of thick cross-ply laminated circular cylindrical shells with arbitrary boundary conditions. Based on first-order shear deformation theory, selecting an appropriate state vector, equations of thick cross-ply laminated cylindrical shells established in physical space using the elasticity are introduced into the symplectic dual system to form a unified governing equation. The state vector can be described as the superposition of wave shapes in the symplectic space, and directly excited waves can be explicitly calculated using the conjugate symplectic orthogonal relation of the wave shapes. The relationships between incident and reflected waves at the left and right ends are respectively established, which leads to the analytical description of arbitrary boundary conditions. The present method can simultaneously solve the displacement and internal force responses of a cylindrical shell, which has high computational efficiency. In addition, compared to Lévy solution, the present method has truncation error only in the circumferential direction and is analytical in the axial direction, which leads to a high accuracy and rate of convergence. Numerical examples show the effectiveness, convergence and accuracy of the present method.