Ring footing is widely used for supporting structures like chimney, storage tank, silos, and the like. Ultimate bearing capacity of ring footing is an important concern in engineering design. The ring footing problem is axisymmetric in nature and the geometry of the ring footing and the density and strength of the supporting soil have an impact on its bearing capacity. In this paper the behavior of ring footing on sand has been studied using Finite Element software PLAXIS 2D, varying radii ratio, density and angle of shearing resistance of sand. The radii ratio (ri/ro, where ri and ro are inner and outer radii of the ring footing, respectively, which may be termed as geometrical characteristic of ring footing), is varied from 0.25 to 0.71. The Mohr–Coulomb failure criterion is used in the analyses. The effects of radii ratios on load-settlement curve and ultimate bearing capacity of ring footing along with vertical stress profile (corresponding to ultimate bearing capacity) at the middle of the influence zone have been investigated. It has been observed that the ultimate bearing capacity increases with increase of radii ratio. It has also been observed that the vertical stress of a point at the center of the influence zone decreases as the ratio of radii increases. Further attempt has been made to develop a prediction model of bearing capacity, based on regression analysis. The outcome of this study may be useful to the practicing engineers involved in geotechnical design of ring footing.