A generalized layerwise displacement base higher order shear deformation theory and its finite element formulation for the bending analysis of symmetric laminated and sandwich composite plates are presented. New layerwise HSDTs are presented for the first time. The proposed generalized layerwise HSDT have limited DOFs, because they are independent of the number of layers, and it accounts for non-linear and constant variation of in-plane and transverse displacement respectively through the plate thickness. Results shows that some of the new non-polynomial layerwise HSDTs, having the same or even less DOFs, are more accurate than well-known non-polynomial layerwise HSDTs available in the literature. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd.