Reinforced soil walls have become very popular in seismic areas owing to their flexible nature and cost effectiveness when compared to the conventional retaining structures. Although the use of reinforced soil walls with modular block facings and gabion facings is growing world wide at a rapid rate, the seismic response of these walls is yet to be analyzed. This paper discusses the response of these walls in terms of lateral facing deflection, reinforcement tensile force and crest surface settlement when subjected to seismic loading simulated by means of a variable amplitude harmonic vibration using the finite element analysis package, PLAXIS V8. From the study, it was found that there is significant effect of seismic loading on the response of reinforced soil walls and the analyses and design of these walls are to be done only after considering the dynamic earthquake loading in seismic prone areas. The gabion faced reinforced soil walls were found to be more effective than the segmental walls in resisting the dynamic excitations due to earthquake loading. The study also confirmed that various reinforcement design parameters and backfill parameters play an important role in minimizing the facing deflection and the settlement of the wall subjected to dynamic earthquake excitation.