Abstract: Aiming at the current lack of analytical research concerning the cylindrical shell-flow field coupling vibration and sound radiation system under the influence of a free surface, this paper proposes an analytical method which solves the vibration response and far-field acoustic radiation of a finite cylindrical shell immersed at a finite depth. Based on the image method and Graf addition theorem, the analytical expression of the fluid velocity potential can be obtained, then combined with the energy functional of the variation method to deduce the shell-liquid coupling vibration equation, which can in turn solve the forced vibration response. The research shows that, compared with an infinite fluid, a free surface can increase at the same order of resonance frequency; but as the depth of immersion gradually increases, the mean square vibration velocity tends to become the same as that in an infinite fluid. Compared with numerical results from Nastran software, this shows that the present method is accurate and reliable, and has such advantages as a simple method and a small amount of calculation. The far-field radiated pressure can be obtained by the vibration response using the Fourier transformation and stationary phase method. The results indicate that the directivity and volatility of the far-field acoustic pressure of a cylindrical shell is similar to that of an acoustical dipole due to the free surface. However, the far-field acoustic pressure is very different from the vibration characteristics, and will not tend to an infinite fluid as the submerging depth increases. Compared with the numerical method, the method in this paper is simpler and has a higher computational efficiency. It enables the far-field acoustic radiation of an underwater cylindrical shell to be predicted quickly under the influence of external incentives and the free surface, providing guiding significance for acoustic research into the half space structure vibration problem.