In the seismic design of structures, capacity design is typically employed to ensure that a desirable ductile response is obtained. In this paper three different capacity design approaches for reinforced concrete coupled walls are investigated. For a simple case study building, the expected capacity design shear forces and bending moments are calculated using the different approaches. The results are then assessed against the corresponding actions found from nonlinear time-history analysis. The performance of each approach is discussed, along with some of the difficulties associated with undertaking the capacity design of coupled walls.