Abstract. Hydromagnetic waves, especially those of frequencies in the range of a few millihertz to a few hertz observed in the Earth's magnetosphere, are categorized as ultra low-frequency (ULF) waves or pulsations. They have been extensively studied due to their importance in the interaction with radiation belt particles and in probing the structures of the magnetosphere. We developed an approach to examining the toroidal standing Aflvén waves in a background magnetic field by recasting the wave equation into a Klein–Gordon (KG) form along individual field lines. The eigenvalue solutions to the system are characteristic of a propagation type when the corresponding eigenfrequency is greater than a critical frequency and a decaying type otherwise. We apply the approach to a compressed-dipole magnetic field model of the inner magnetosphere and obtain the spatial profiles of relevant parameters and the spatial wave forms of harmonic oscillations. We further extend the approach to poloidal-mode standing Alfvén waves along field lines. In particular, we present a quantitative comparison with a recent spacecraft observation of a poloidal standing Alfvén wave in the Earth's magnetosphere. Our analysis based on the KG equation yields consistent results which agree with the spacecraft measurements of the wave period and the amplitude ratio between the magnetic field and electric field perturbations.