A total of 10 iodine-starch staining experiments with different initial soil water contents and infiltration amounts were conducted in loam (6 plots in total) and silty clay (4 plots in total). The infiltration depth and distribution pattern of dye-stained region were measured and calculated to study the impacts of infiltration backgrounds (i.e. initial soil water content, infiltration amount, and soil texture) on preferential soil water flow. This results indicated that, (1) a higher initial soil water content tended to make a larger maximum infiltration depth, while the initial soil water content displayed no obvious impacts on the distribution pattern of dye-stained region. (2) The maximum infiltration depth increased with the increment of infiltration amount, but the impact of the increment of infiltration amount on the increment of the maximum infiltration depth was not unlimited. (3) As the infiltration amount increases, the flow pattern transferred from the flow pattern dominated by the preferential flow to the flow pattern dominated by the matrix flow. (4) The soil water flow in the finer-textured soil (silty clay in this research) was more heterogeneous when under the same infiltration amount and initial soil water content, and the total area of the flow paths was narrower in the finer-textured soil.