PURPOSE: To simply extract a feature from a handwritten character, to improve the collation accuracy with a dictionary for recognition, and to enhance the recognition rate by providing a feature extracting part for analyzing a distribution of strength and extracting the feature, and a recognizing part for collating a character in a dictionary and an input character.

CONSTITUTION: This handwritten character recognizing device is provided with a CPU 16 for managing an operation of the whole device, an input/output part 100 for executing an input of a handwritten character and an output of a result of recognition, a feature extracting part 120, recognizing parts 140, 160, a system memory 17, and a dictionary 18 for storing a dictionary for recognition, and each of them is connected mutually through a system bus 19. In such a state, in the feature extracting part 120, a distribution of strength in the vicinity of each picture element for constituting a pattern of an input character is approximated by a polynomical expression, and a feature of a character pattern is extracted from the combination of magnitude of a coefficient of the polynomical expression. Also, in the recognizing parts 140, 160, a feature of an input character and a feature of a character in a storage dictionary are collated directly.