Aiming at the path following control of underactuated ships under the condition of model uncertainties and external disturbances due to winds, waves and currents, a novel modified dynamical virtual ship (DVS) guidance algorithm was proposed. Command filter backstepping technology was introduced to design the virtual control law of surge speed and yawing angular velocity in ship’s kinematic loop, and the path following problem was transformed into the error stabilizing problem. In ship’s dynamic loop, PI integral sliding mode control technology was introduced to design the actual control law. In short, this control strategy can reduce the computing burdens and avoid high frequency noise’s influence caused by differentiating the virtual control law, furthermore be robust against the model uncertainties and external disturbances. Simulation experiments show that this control strategy can realize underactuated ship’s precise following of the planned route under the condition of model parameters uncertainties and unknown disturbances coming from winds, waves and currents.