In code-division multiple-access (CDMA) systems with soft handoff, mobile station (MS) within soft handoff region can use multiple radio channels and receive their signals from multiple base stations (BSs) simultaneously. In this paper, the effects of soft handoff region ratio (SHRR) on reverse link of a CDMA cellular system are analytically investigated. In order to analyze the network performance and quality of service (QoS) perceived by users more realistically, both the soft capacity increasing factor and the traffic load variation affected by SHRR are jointly considered and a two-dimensional continuous time Markov chain (CTMC) model is built. In the numerical example, it is observed that the optimal guard channel exists according the variations of the traffic load and propagation conditions when the proper value of SHRR is determined.