This is a report on an effective simulation method for the bending loss analyses of photonic crystal fibers. This method is based on the two-dimensional finite-difference time-domain algorithm and a conformal transformation of the refractive index profile. We observed the temporal dynamics of light waves in a bent fiber in a simulation and obtained the bending loss as a function of bend radius and optical wavelength for the commercial photonic crystal fibers. The accuracy of this method was verified by good agreement between the simulation and experimental data. (c) 2008 Optical Society of America.