Recently, many important results have been established for solving the following problem in linear system theory: Design a dynamic output feedback compensator such that the gain of the closed-loop transfer function is minimized over all frequencies. This paper considers disturbance attenuation and H∞ optimization with linear static output feedback control. Under certain minimum phase assumption on the open-loop plant and the condition that the open-loop system is stabilizable using high gain feedback, the achievable disturbance attenuation level with constraint linear static output feedback is obtained. A synthesis procedure to achieve prespecified disturbance attenuation is developed and illustrated by means of an example. © 1994 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc., All rights reserved.