Abstract Free fall drop weight impact testing is an optimum option for studying the impact behavior of various materials under low to medium strain rates because of its applicability in these ranges of strain rates. Herein, drop weight impact test is simulated using non-linear finite element code LS-DYNA®. The material, considered herein for test simulation, is aluminum cenosphere syntactic foam. Three different impact velocities with three different foam models, available in LS-DYNA®, are used to understand the effect of impact velocities and material model on the impact behavior of the considered foam. In the present study, FE model is developed using LS-DYNA® for drop weight impact test wherein, a bilinear material model is used for hammer and three material models i.e. crushable foam, Deshpande-Fleck foam, piecewise linear plasticity are used to model the foam. Based on simulation, force-displacement relation is developed for studying the energy absorption under varying impact velocities and foam models.