The resonant responses are investigated for the porous-hyperelastic Mooney–Rivlin cylindrical shell subjected to a radial harmonic excitation. Considering the higher-order shear deformation theory (HSDT), fourth-order strain-displacement relations are derived, which include the radial geometric imperfections varying along the thickness direction. Using the porous-hyperelastic Mooney–Rivlin constitution relation and Lagrange equation, the differential governing equations of motion are obtained for the porous-hyperelastic cylindrical shells. The resonant conditions are presented and the accuracy of the mathematical models is verified. The harmonic balance and pseudo-arc length continuation methods are used to obtain the amplitude-frequency and forced-amplitude curves. The stability of the solutions is analyzed by Floquet theory. The effects of the external excitation amplitudes, structure parameters and porosity infill parameters on the linear frequencies, amplitude-frequency responses and force-amplitude responses are discussed for the imperfect porous-hyperelastic cylindrical shells. The results show that the linear frequencies of the porous-hyperelastic cylindrical shells increase obviously as the uniform and sigmoid function porosity parameters reach the certain values. The increase of the structure parameters enhances the response amplitudes of the first-order mode and minified response amplitudes of the second-order mode. The decreasing porosity ratios weaken the softening nonlinear behaviors of the porous-hyperelastic cylindrical shells. With the changes of the external excitation amplitudes and structure parameters, the motion of the porous-hyperelastic cylindrical shell indicates that the synchronous vibrations occur with the period and chaotic vibrations alternately.