Capacitive pressure sensors (CPS) are widely used in robotics, prosthetics, biomimetics, and biosens ing. Existing CPS—including those with engineered dielectrics, engineered electrodes, and hybrid capaci tive–resistive responses—are modeled separately and therefore lack generalizable design rules. In this work, we develop a unified analytical model that captures concurrent capacitive and resistive transduction in CPS with porous sensing layers, whose dielectric loss can span the full possible range. The model yields a closed-form solution for CPS sensitivity in terms of five material and structural parameters. Experimental validation is performed using a porous nanocomposite (PNC) with varying conductive filler doping ratios and dielectric layer thicknesses. The analysis reveals that (i) the dielectric loss of the PNC is a dominant yet previously understudied performance descriptor; (ii) CPS sensitivity is also controlled by the thickness ratio between the porous sensing layer and the dielectric layer; and (iii) with everything else fixed, there is an optimal filler concentration for maximal CPS sensitivity. This framework unifies disparate dielectric losses of the porous media, unveils the fundamental connection and difference of various types of CPS, and ultimately provides simple guidance for the material–structural optimization of CPS.