Developing more effective vibration control systems is a hot topic in the field of structural vibration control. In the past decades, many types of control systems have been developed, including the well-known particle dampers (PDs). However, the widespread applications of particle dampers are still limited due to some inherent issues: namely large secondary mass and low capacity of energy dissipation in some cases. To address the above issues, a novel particle tuned inertial damper (PTID) is proposed based on the concept of inerter. In particular, the configuration and working mechanism of PTID are first introduced, and a multi-objective optimization framework is formulated by concurrently minimizing both the displacement and acceleration responses. Subsequently, the seismic control effectiveness of PTID is demonstrated by using a single-degree-of-freedom (SDOF) system, and parametric studies are performed to investigate the influences of the preassigned particle mass ratio, inertance-to-mass ratio and amplification factor on the optimal parameters and control performance of PTID. Finally, case studies are performed to further illustrate the control effectiveness of PTID in the seismic protection of a three-story structure. The results demonstrate that, compared to the traditional PD, the proposed PTID could more effectively suppress both the displacement and acceleration responses by utilizing a much smaller particle mass ratio; and increasing the particle mass ratio and amplification factor can enhance the control effectiveness of PTID.