Hydrogen gas cycling test can provides stress factors associated with rapid and simultaneous interior pressure and temperature swings and infusion of hydrogen into materials; therefore, it is considered as an effective method to detect the safety of the compressed hydrogen storage system. However, the energy consumption of gas cycling test is high. In order to reduce energy consumption, an optimization gas cycling test system was designed based on multi-stage storage and self-pressurized method in this paper. A dynamic simulation model which considers the process of refueling, pressure control, pre-cooling and discharging was also established to calculate the energy consumption. Using the model, the energy consumption of different system with different storage stages, different pressure, and different volumes was calculated. The results show that with the increase of gas storage stages, total energy consumption of the system decreases, but taking into account the complexity of the system, the stages should be less than three; In the range of 20 -50 MPa and 1-4 m(3), lower pressure and smaller volume of low pressure tank can not only reduce the gas the construction cost, but also reduce the energy consumption; In the range of 45-60 MPa and 1-3 m(3), the effect of medium pressure tank on the energy consumption is not significant. This study provides a new optimization design method for compressed hydrogen cycling test system, has an important significance in development of high pressure hydrogen gas cycling test. (C) 2016 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.