Abstract: The fiber angles of the winding tubes were changed by controlling the winding lines to realize the gradual change of the stiffness along the axial direction, and then the collapse-stable carbon fiber/epoxy resin composite thin-walled tubes with variable stiffness were fabricated. Finally, the axial quasi-static crushing tests were carried out for three types of winding tubes with variable stiffness, ±45°_n and 90°_n structures. Combined with digital image correlation (DSC) technology and finite element analysis results, the initial strain modes, damage evolution and stress states were compared to study the crushing response and failure mechanism of variable stiffness structures. The results show that the initial failure and damage evolution of the tubes with different fiber angles are different due to the various axial stiffness, so the different crushing response and failure modes are generated respectively, and the continuously changing circular fibers in the variable stiffness zone can effectively cause the delaminated and “flowering” mode mixed damage to release the strain energy slowly. Therefore, the energy absorption effect of the variable stiffness structure is obviously better than that of other two structures. Its peak load is 66.97 kN, crushing efficiency is 50.8%, and specific energy absorption is 10.1 kJ/kg. Compared with the ±45°_n structure, the specific energy absorption increases by 156.35%, and the crushing efficiency increases by 518.76%. Compared with the 90°_n structure, the specific energy absorption increases by 16.9%, and the crushing efficiency reduces by 27.3%.