The invention discloses a bio-feature authentication method and apparatus. The method comprises the steps of obtaining an image of a to-be-authenticated bio-feature; coding the image of the to-be-authenticated bio-feature to obtain a feature code of the to-be-authenticated bio-feature; by utilizing joint feature distribution, calculating the similarity between the feature code of the to-be-authenticated bio-feature and a preset feature code; and if the similarity is greater than or equal to preset similarity, determining that the authentication of the to-be-authenticated bio-feature succeeds.The technical problem of low authentication precision due to the fact that a bio-feature in a low-quality image is authenticated by adopting an existing bio-feature authentication method is solved.