A wide-area image acquiring method which includes capturing a global image in a preset wide-area visual area, capturing at least two partial images whose definition is preset and that are in the preset wide-area visual area, where the global image covers at least an overlap portion of view ranges of the partial images in the preset wide-area visual area, and a sum of the view ranges of the at least two partial images is greater than or equal to a view range of the global image, determining, in the global image, positions of edges of the partial images, based on same shot objects in the partial images and the global image, and performing splice processing on the at least two partial images according to the positions of the edges, to obtain a composite wide-area image of the wide-area visual area.