To improve the progressive collapse resistance of RC frame structures， one of the often-used methods is to increase the reinforcement amounts of longitudinal reinforcement in girders. However， this method may lead to the adverse failure mode of “strong beam-weak column” under earthquakes. In view of this， an alternative method that has the advantage of improving the progressive collapse resistance of the RC frame structures without affecting their seismic performance is proposed in this study， which uses kinked steel plates locally debonding and embedded in the RC girders. First， low-cycle reciprocating tests were conducted on RC beams using kinked steel plates with different height-to-length ratio （ratio of the height hkp to the length lkp of a kinked steel plate）. Test results identify that the RC beam with an appropriate height-length ratio of 3/40 has similar behavior to the conventional RC beam in terms of bearing capacity， stiffness degradation characteristics， energy dissipation capacity and deformation mode. Furthermore， parametric analysis was carried out using numerical simulation， revealing appropriate height-length ratios ranging from 1/8 to 1/16. Finally， pushover and pushdown analyses of the designed RC frame structure were conducted. The results show that the employment of kinked steel plates with an appropriate height-to-length ratio （taking 1/10 in case study） exhibits little effect on seismic performance of structures， but largely improves their progressive collapse resistance.