Pore gas has a significant influence on rock strength. This study performed triaxial compression tests of gas-infiltrated sandy shale samples to investigate the strength characteristics under gas pressures of 0 and 2 MPa. The effective stress coefficient was evaluated while considering the gas and solid coupling effect, and was found to decrease with increasing confining pressure. The calculated and different assumed coefficient values (0 and 1) were applied to obtain the effective principal stress. The experimental results would serve as fundamental strength data for fitting analysis in failure criterion work. The Mohr-Coulomb, Hoek-Brown, Drucker-Prager, linear Mogi, and non-linear Mogi criteria were modified based on the effective stress principle of porous rock. In addition, the RMSE, cohesion, and internal friction angle were utilized for a quantitative criterion comparison. The results showed that the Mohr-Coulomb, Drucker-Prager, and linear Mogi failure criteria led to higher errors, whereas the Hoek-Brown criterion gave an apparent distortion as a result of the empirical strength parameters. Moreover, the non-linear Mogi criterion showed a good fit. The predicted strength was overestimated when α = 0 and underestimated when α = 1, with a more accurate strength estimated when the effective stress coefficient was calculated using the effective stress principle.