In an optical distance measuring apparatus, a light source irradiates a target object with a light pulse having a first pulse width. A light receiver outputs a pulse signal that represents reflection light from the target object being incident on the light receiver, and has a second pulse width that is larger than or equal to the first pulse width. A histogram generator records, every predetermined period, a frequency representing the number of outputted pulse signals to thereby generate a histogram. A peak detector detects, from the histogram, an edge point of a peak figure included in the histogram. A distance calculator subtracts, from a time indicative of the edge point of the peak figure, a time length of the second pulse width to thereby calculate a target time, and calculates a distance to the target object as a function of the calculated target time.