An image characteristic estimation method and device is presented, where content of the method includes extracting at least two eigenvalues of input image data, and executing the following operations for each extracted eigenvalue, until execution for the extracted eigenvalues is completed. Selecting an eigenvalue, and performing at least two matrix transformations on the eigenvalue using a pre-obtained matrix parameter in order to obtain a first matrix vector corresponding to the eigenvalue; when a first matrix vector corresponding to each extracted eigenvalue is obtained, obtaining second matrix vectors with respect to the at least two extracted eigenvalues using a convolutional network calculation method according to the obtained first matrix vector corresponding to each eigenvalue; and obtaining a status of an image characteristic in the image data by means of estimation according to the second matrix vectors. In this way, accuracy of estimation is effectively improved.