According to the problems of only obtaining discrete data under specific position of excavator when the digging force is computed with traditional theoretical analysis method,a new way was presented for calculating the digging force corresponding to the excavating trajectory.The simulation model was built based on the virtual prototype technology,the cylinder displacement and pressure coming from the load experiment were taken as simulation input data to calculate the digging force in the whole digging area.The experimental result shows that this calculating method is correct and can provide load data for the static and dynamic analysis of the excavator.