A handwriting recognition method and a handwriting recognition device are provided to recognize a character sequence continuously inputted by a user for convenience. The present method comprises steps of calculating various features of the inputted character sequence which include single character recognition accuracy features and space geometry features of different stroke combinations in the inputted character sequence, calculating segmentation reliabilities of respective stroke combinations in different segmented patterns by using a probabilistic model in which coefficients of the probabilistic model are estimated by a parameter estimation method through sample trainings, recognizing characters in different writing patterns by using a multiple-template matching method when performing single character recognition of the stroke combinations, searching for the best segmentation path and conducting post-processing to optimize the recognition results. The present method and device have advantages of simple structure, low hardware requirement, fast recognition speed and high recognition accuracy and can be implemented in an embedded system.