PURPOSE: To reduce power consumption, to precisely detect a maximum signal and a minimum signal and to facilitate manufacture in a maximum signal and minimum signal detection circuit used in a solid-state image pickup device.

CONSTITUTION: Signals generated in plural photoelectric conversion elements are read to terminals 19-23, the signals are tentatively held in capacitances 13-1 to 13-5 and the signals are time sequentially and successively read to an output line 2 by a shift register 1. Thereafter, by performing comparison with the signals held in the capacitance Cs 12 in a comparator 7, a MOS transistor is driven from the result and the lowest value of the photoelectric conversion elements is preserved in the capacitance Cs 12. By repeating it for a required bit number, the lowest value of the signals read from this solid-state image pickup device is outputted finally.