The basic objective of the work reported in this paper is to extend a nine-node degenerated shell element developed earlier for stress analysis to the free vibration analysis of thick laminated composites. The nine-noded degenerated shell element is preferable to conventional solid elements for the modeling and analysis of laminated composite shell structures since the shell element works for both thick and thin shells. An enhanced interpolation of the transverse shear strains in the natural coordinates is used in this formulation to produce a shear locking free element and an enhanced interpolation of the membrane strains in the local coordinates is used to produce a membrane locking free element. The interpolation functions used in formulating the assumed strains are based on the Lagrangian interpolation polynomials. Various numerical examples are analyzed and their results are compared with the existing exact solutions where available and the numerical solutions calculated from other shell finite element formulations, to benchmark the current formulation. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.