Thick cylindrical shells under transverse loading exhibit an elephant foot buckling mode, whereas moderately thick cylindrical shells show a diamond buckling mode. There exists some intermediate geome- try at which the transition between buckling modes can take place. This behavior is significantly influenced by the radius-to-thickness ratio and the material yield strength, rather than the length-to-radius ratio and the axial force. This paper presents a critical value at which the transition of buckling modes occurs as a func- tion of the radius-to-thickness ratio and the material yield strength. The result shows that the circumferential wave number of the diamond buckling mode increases with decreasing wall thickness. The strain concentra- tion is also intensified for the diamond buckling modes compared with the elephant foot buckling modes.