The atmospheric scattering effect is important influence factor on received pulse waveform of satellite laser altimeter. According to the relationship expression between the received pulse signal (RPS) and atmospheric response function, the geometric track and scattering probability of laser beam were analyzed under the condition of ignoring multiple atmospheric scattering effects. Moreover, the analytic models on characteristic parameters of scattering laser pulse and RPS were deduced. In terms of geosicence laser altimeter system(GLAS) parameters, the impact of atmospheric medium distribution, laser pointing angle and slope angle on characteristic parameters of RPS were simulated by using method of numerical simulation. The results show that the maximums of energy, centroid and RMS pulse-width of RPS are separately more than 15%, 250 cm and 800 cm, when the ranges on height and particle radium of scattering medium are 0.2-6 km and 0-120 μm. Meanwhile, with the increment of laser pointing angle and target slope angle, the energy of RPS remains basically unchanged, but the centroid and RMS pulse-width present incremental trend. The Gaussian fitting algorithm contributes to reduce the influence of atmospheric scattering effect on RPS. The final conclusion has instructive significance for the processing and analysis of RPS and assessment of laser range precession.