Abstract An approach for calculating the dynamic characteristics of rubber isolators based on hyperelastic-viscoelastic model is investigated. The fundamental theory for frequency domain viscoelasticity is reviewed, and the experimental method for obtaining the viscoelastic parameters of rubber material is presented. A hyperelastic-viscoelastic model of rubber is proposed. The model parameters for viscoelastic model are obtained using dynamic simple shear test, and the model parameters for hyperelastic model are estimated using uniaxial and planer tension tests. The dynamic properties of the simple shear specimens for obtaining model parameters are calculated with the proposed material model. The calculated results match well the measured data. It is shown that the proposed methods for obtaining model parameters are effective. Taking a suspension bushing as a studying example, the dynamic and static characteristics of the rubber bushing with different diameter-shrinking are calculated, and the results agree well with the experiment. The proposed methods for estimating dynamic performances of rubber isolators in this paper can be used for calculating the dynamic properties of elastomeric mounts and bushings in automotive industry.