The paper presents the results of an experimental investigation on the plastic shrinkage of steel fibre reinforced concrete (SFRC). Tests were carried out on mixes with cement content ranging between 370 and 468 kg m−3. Four types of steel fibres were used: melt extract, hooked, crimped and Harex. The volume of, fibres ranged between 0 and 4.47% of the mix volume. The results show that fibre reinforcement leads to significantly lower plastic shrinkage-reductions of up to 60% were observed. Crimped and Harex fibres were more effective in restraining plastic shrinkage compared with melt extract and hooked fibres, owing to their superior anchorage characteristics. A theoretical expression is also derived to predict the plastic shrinkage of SFRC, efp, in terms of the shrinkage of concrete, eop. This is based on a schematic element of the composite comprising of an idealized, discrete fibre providing shrinkage restraint to a thick cylinder of matrix. The resulting expression is efp=eop{1-0.306μvf(l/d)[(s-d)/dl]}. The term μ represents the fibre-matrix interfacial property of shear resistance. The results indicate that μ increases with increasing vfl/d ratio and that fibre with superior anchorage characteristics lead to higher values of μ.