Reduction of the thermal stresses in machine elements that are subjected to severe thermal loadings was achieved by developing two-dimensional functionally graded material, 2D-FGM. In the current investigation composition optimization for ZrO2/6061-T6/Ti-6Al-4V 2D-FGM, under severe thermal loading cycle that consists of heating followed by cooling, was carried out based on the minimization of temperatures, thermal and residual stresses to achieve more reduction of the thermal stresses. It was found that optimum composition based on minimum value of the maximum temperature for ZrO2/6061-T6/Ti-6Al-4V 2D-FGM was achieved for mx = 0.1 and my = 0.1. While optimum composition based on minimum value of the maximum normalized equivalent stresses for ZrO2/6061-T6/Ti-6Al-4V 2D-FGM was achieved for mx = 0.1 and my = 5, where mx and my are the composition variation parameters in x and y directions respectively. Also, the obtained optimum composition of ZrO2/6061-T6/Ti-6Al-4V 2D-FGM can stands well with the adopted severe thermal loading without any plastic deformation or residual stresses where the maximum value of the normalized equivalent stresses during heating stage was 0.8 and the maximum value of the normalized equivalent stresses during cooling stage was 0.24.