The invention relates to the field of control engineering and discloses a recognition method and device for a material pile model for material taking with a material taking machine. The recognition method includes the steps of obtaining the material pile model, dividing a material pile into a plurality of material taking layers according to the size of the material pile, and determining the material taking start point and the material taking termination point of each material taking layer. In this way, intelligent recognition of coal pile information can be realized, implementation of full-automatic operation of the material taking machine is facilitated, and operation efficiency is improved.