Taking the sand soil in the limited range behind the retaining wall as the object, the relationship between the retaining wall displacement and the internal and external friction angles is established. Assuming that the earth behind the wall is arc-shaped and considering the shear stress between the soil layers, the angle of fracture surface and passive earth pressure coefficient under the hypothesis of multichannel slip surfaces are adopted, and then the theoretical formula of passive earth pressure with limited soil is derived. It can also be degenerated into the solution of passive earth pressure with semi-infinite soil. Compared with the model test, the proposed theoretical solution is in good consistency with the experimental values, which verifies the rationality of the analytical solutions. Parameter analysis shows that: considering the inter-layer shear stress, the total value of passive earth pressure is not influenced, while the position of action point is higher. The passive earth pressure changes little at first and then increases significantly with the decrease of the soil aspect ratio. With the increase of the internal friction angle, the resultant of passive earth pressure increases while the position of action point is lower.