Ship cranes operating at sea are exposed to high risks, primarily due to payload swing caused by wind and waves. Therefore, the installation of anti-swing devices on the crane is deemed necessary. However, it should be noted that the crane's working efficiency is affected by the increased load resulting from the installation of such devices. Thus, a lightweight design of the anti-swing device structure for ship cranes was required. In order to minimize the weight of the anti-swing device structure for ship cranes a mathematical model for structural optimization was establish. The structure of the anti-swing device for ship cranes was optimized using PSO (particle swarm optimization) algorithm, and improvements were made to the algorithm parameters. After optimization, a reduction of 28. 64% in the total weight of the structure was achieved compared to before optimization. The analysis of the optimization process and results demonstrates that the PSO algorithm, in contrast to the commonly used genetic algorithm in structural optimization, exhibits rapid convergence to the global optimal solution, high solution accuracy, and stable algorithm operation. The optimized results meet the requirements of engineering application, affirming the feasibility and effectiveness of the PSO algorithm in the structural optimization design of anti-swing devices for ship cranes.