With the increasing demand of flexibility and ductibility in microelectromechanical systems, a novel type of surface acoustic wave(SAW) devices based on ZnO/polyimide laminated structure was proposed. The characteristics of impedance and the particle displacement fields at resonant frequencies of flexible SAW devices were investigated using finite element method by COMSOL Multiphysics software.The effect of thicknesses of ZnO films on frequencies and phase velocities of Rayleigh waves was analyzed. To verify the accuracy of simulation, three groups of flexible SAW devices with the wavelengths of 16 μm and ZnO thicknesses of 1.2 μm, 2.3 μm and 4 μm were fabricated respectively, by magnetron sputtering technology and UVlight photolithograph. Results showed that the simulated and measured data were consistent in a great agreement. Additionally, both simulations and experiments verified the conclusion that the increase in ZnO thicknesses would lead to an increase in equivalent acoustic velocities and resonant frequencies.