Carbon fiber-reinforced plastics (CFRPs) used extensively in the aerospace and automobile industries pose a challenge into machining techniques because of their hard-machine property. Abrasive waterjet (AWJ) as an emerging technology has been certified as the effective technology to machine such materials, especially for AWJ cutting. In order to further improve the cutting kerf quality without sacrifice of efficiency, this paper is aimed to originally investigate CFRP cutting using multi-pass process with changed parameters among different passes, which is indeed absent in previous works. At first, the material removal mechanism by AWJ multi-pass cutting was discussed to explore the delamination mechanism related to removal material behaviors and to certify that multi-pass cutting can be applied into CFRP machining. The micro-machining including microcutting, plow, and brittle fracture of fibers and matrix was prime material removal mechanism, and the inter-laminar delamination occurring at exit zone was related to the dominant removal mechanism of brittle fracture of fibers, which was influenced heavily by parameters selected. Secondly, the kerf quality produced by the multi-pass cutting with changed parameters and constant parameters is comparatively analyzed. The former could further reduce 53% of kerf taper and improve efficiency 13% as appropriate parameters selected without sacrifice of kerf quality. Regarding the surface quality in smooth cutting zone (SCZ), the former did not show an advantage over the later unless highly increasing pressure at second-pass cutting. It was also induced from experimental results that arranging the low traverse speed at first-pass cutting was superior to it at second-pass cutting.