When performing a stress-relaxation test of soft tissues, a small preload is usually applied to the specimen to remove slack, and this preload is generally be neglected. However, for tissues with low stiffness, preload may be a significant percentage of its peak stress. In this study, based on the quasi-linear viscoelastic (QLV) theory and by a simulated experiment, the effects of the preload on the estimation of the viscoelastic behavior of soft tissue were evaluated at different ratios of prestress to pea...