Multilayer radar absorbing materials with light weight, strong absorption, and wide absorption bandwidth are urgently demanded with the increase of electromagnetic pollution. However, the current design methods with only simulation operation or optimization strategy are not comprehensive. Here, a simulation-optimization approach including electromagnetic simulation and numerical calculation is proposed based on the interaction between different software, in which the homogeneous medium substitution method is presented to simplify the complicated structures. Besides, return loss and impedance matching of different layer structures are investigated. From the simulated results, it can be found that the structures with better impedance matching have superior absorbing performance. The optimal method shows the advantages of fast and efficient, which has tremendous potential for various applications, such as military stealth and electromagnetic wave elimination.