Friction stir spot welding (FSSW) is a recent joining technique developed for spot welding of thin metal sheets. This process currently finds application in automotive, aerospace, marine and sheet metal industry. In this work, the effect of FSSW process parameters namely tool rotation speed, shoulder diameter and dwell time on Tensile shear failure load (TSFL) is investigated. Box-Behnken design is selected for conducting experiments. Fuzzy based soft computing is used to develop a model for TSFL of AA6061 joints fabricated by FSSW. The interaction of the process parameters on TSFL is also presented. © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.