In the present paper a method is proposed to investigate the free vibration of a partially liquid-filled cylindrical tank. The mechanical properties of the container are assumed to change continuously along the thickness according to volume fraction Power-law, Sigmoid or Exponential distribution. The liquid is supposed to be incompressible and in viscid and its velocity potential is formulated by using Eigen function expansions. The interaction between the liquid and the plate was considered and the dynamic characteristics of the plate are extracted by using the Rayleigh–Ritz method. The results from the proposed method are in good agreement with experimental and numerical solutions available in the literature. A finite element analysis is also applied to check the validity of the results. Furthermore, the influence of various variables such as the number of nodal circles and diameters, volume fractions of functionally graded materials and liquid level on the dynamic behavior of the coupled system is investigated. پرونده مقاله