A pre-pit detecting apparatus which, when a light beam is radiated onto an optical recording medium having a recording surface with pre-pits repeatedly formed between tracks, receives light reflected by the recording surface with first and second light receiving faces, obtains the push-pull signal corresponding to the light receiving signals for the first and second light receiving faces, and binarizes the push-pull signal by using a threshold value to generate a pre-pit detection signal. It is judged which area of a plurality of areas including at least a not-yet-recorded area corresponds to a position of the recording surface where the light beam is radiated is performed to judge. Then the threshold value is set in accordance with the judgement result.