For a rigid retaining wall with rough face, the magnitude and distribution of active earth pressure on the wall are affected by the shape of failure surface and arching effect developed in the backfill as well as internal friction angle of the backfill and wall friction angle. Therefore, the practical shape of failure surface and arching effect in the backfill must be considered to acquire accurate magnitude and non-linear distribution of active earth pressure acting on the rigid retaining wall. In this study, a new formulation for calculating the active earth pressure on a rough rigid retaining wall rotating about the top is proposed considering the practical shape of non-linear failure surface and arching effects. Accuracy of the proposed equation is checked through comparisons of calculations from the proposed equations with existing model test results. The comparisons show that the proposed equations produce satisfactory results.