Abstract: A new solution for the consolidation of soils with penetrating drain wells under the condition of equal vertical strain is presented and the effectiveness of existing analytical theories for drain wells under the same condition is investigated theoretically in this paper. It is found that, due to improper mathematical treatments, Barron’s classical theory concerning well resistance is unable to give reasonable result while Hansbo’s is an approximate one. The new one developed by the authors is theoretically more rigorous and the result is more close to that obtained from the rigorous but much more complicated solution developed by Yoshikuni et al. for free vertical strain condition. A sets of curves plotted based on the new solution are then given which can be used conveniently in practice for drain wells problems to take account of the effect of smear and well resistance on the rate of consolidation.