To provide "a method and device for recognizing road direction" detecting the direction of a driving road based on a candidate lane mark even when a lane mark is not exactly recognized.

When the direction of the driving road is detected by an image picked up with an on-vehicle imaging apparatus, a photography angle range in front of a vehicle is divided into a plurality to set a plurality of direction areas, the candidate lane marks as candidates for the lane mark are extracted from a pickup image, direction areas to which each of the extracted candidate lane marks belong are determined, the total length of the candidate lane marks belonging to the direction areas is calculated for every direction area, and the direction of the direction area with the largest total length of the calculated candidate lane marks among the plurality of direction areas is decided as the direction of the driving road.