Basic amino acids (BAA) like L-arginine (L-Arg), L-lysine (L-Lys) and L-histidine (L-His) with final mass concentrations of 1 g/L, 3 g/L or 5 g/L were added to 120 g/L whey protein solutions, respectively, and then these samples were thoroughly homogenized and then heated at 90 ℃ for 30 min to prepare heat-induced gels. The work was targeted to investigate the feasibility of BAA modify the functional properties of the gel. The physicochemical changes, texture profile analysis, water sorption and gel electrophoresis were employed to characterize the pH of the gel forming solution, the morphology, texture, hydration properties and leaching protein fractions of the gels. The result indicated that L-Arg, L-Lys or L-His both significantly increased the pH of gel-forming solutions, and whey proteins with treated with BAA can be formed a heat-induced gel with no visible difference in color, morphology and \"self-standing ability\". L-Arg and L-Lys also significantly increased the springiness, cohesiveness, chewiness and resilience of the gel but dramatically decreased its hardness and gumminess, whereas L-His has no dominant influence on the changes of textural properties of the gels (except decreased gumminess). In addition, BAA is incapable of favorably improving water holding capacity but substantially enhancing swelling ratio of the gel, also notably inhibiting protein fractions leaching from the gel, which promoting the integrity of the whey protein gel matrix.