To predict strong ground motions for future large earthquakes including huge subduction earthquakes, it is important to take into account the effects of soil nonlinearity. One of the authors has been developing methods to simulate strong ground motions taking into account the effects of soil nonlinearity (e.g., Nozu and Morikawa, 2003). The methods, however, have been validated only for limited amount of strong motion data, partly because there was only a limited amount of strong motion data affected by soil nonlinearity. Therefore, in this article, making use of strong motion data for the 2011 off the Pacific coast of Tohoku earthquake and the source model developed for the same earthquake by the authors (Nozu and Wakai, 2012), strong motion simulation with considerations of soil nonlinearity was conducted and its effectiveness was studied. In particular, strong motion records with the evident effects of soil nonlinearity was selected and they are simulated using the source model and taking into account empirical site amplification and phase effects (Nozu and Sugano, 2008). Soil nonlinearity was considered using the method of Nozu and Morikawa (2003). The method uses two parameters to represent the effects of soil nonlinearity; one representing the reduction of averaged shear wave velocity within the sediment (ν1) and the other representing the increase of averaged damping factor within the sediment (ν2). In the simulation, ν1 was basically determined based on Wakai and Nozu (2013) andν2 was determined so that the observed ground motion can be simulated as accurately as possible. As a result, it was found that, the duration of strong ground motion tended to be overestimated if the parameterν2 was not used for the sites with the effect of soil nonlinearity. In each of the target sites, by using these two parameters, the simulation result was improved. Thus, the effectiveness of strong motion simulation with considerations of soil nonlinearity was confirmed. Based on the results, the application of the method for future earthquakes was also discussed.