PID controllers are the most widely used because of its advantages of simple design and implementation. However, the controllers produce high overshoot at the initial stage and experience derivative kick effects during the set-point change. On the other hand, the pressure process is highly nonlinear such that its control with PID without modification will be problematic. Therefore, to mitigate these issues this work proposes fractional-ordering of PI-PD controller for the control of the pressure process. The controller retains the simplicity of the PID and maintains the same number of parameters of fractional-order PID. The experimental results show that the proposed controller has performed outperformed PID, PI-PD, and fractional-order PID in terms of overshoot and settling times and disturbance rejection. Furthermore, the controller produces a smoother control signal and reduces the effect of the proportional and derivative kick effects. © 2020 NSP Natural Sciences Publishing Cor. All Rights Reserved.