Abstract Practical simulation technology is of great importance in the design and research of the maglev system. This paper presents a practical vehicle/guideway model based on an in situ vibration test and model updating method. In this model, the guideway is established by the Finite Element method and then updated by the measurement, and the vehicle is simulated as a 10-degree-of-freedom model, which consists of a car-body and eight magnets. The vehicle interacts with the guideway by the magnetic interactive forces, which are tuned by the current feedback controller. The vehicle/guideway interaction problem is solved by the proposed incremental iteration procedure. Two case studies including the Shanghai High-speed Maglev Commercial Operational Line and the High-speed Maglev Test Line at Tongji University were presented for the validation of the proposed model. Finally, the effects of random surface irregularity and distributed magnetic forces were investigated here, and the frequency response of the guideway was analyzed in detail. The results indicate that the proposed model can provide a practical response prediction and analysis because the dynamic characteristics of the guideway and the excitation frequency of the maglev train are reasonably considered in this model.