Abstract This paper investigates the major difficulty associated with the bending of sheet steel products, namely that of material elastic recovery (springback). Key material, and loading factors that influence springback have been assessed from an experimental study of this phenomenon, using a variety of forming methods. The results of which, in conjunction with previously published data are used to derive an expression for predicting springback using a numerical algorithm method. In addition, comparison is made between the best performing analytical model and that of the numerical algorithm derived in this study.