A driving method for a liquid crystal display element including L row electrodes and K column electrodes in which two kinds of data, data corresponding to a logical "0" and data corresponding to a logical "1", are used to display gray shades. The row electrodes are divided into row electrode subgroups which are selected as a batch. When the row electrode subgroups are selected, they have a positive voltage level with respect to a non-election voltage and a negative voltage level with respect to a selection voltage. A matrix of column vector components in which row voltages are time-sequentially arranged form a display cycle in each of the row electrode subgroups, and such a matrix has orthogonality. Row voltages are dispersively applied in a display cycle in each of the row electrode subgroups. Further, a number of column vector components K is related to a number of row electrodes L such that K is a minimum value satisfying the orthogonality and L is.ltoreq.2.sup.P =K, where K, L and P are integers. A gray shade is then effectuated by displaying a plural number of ON and OFF signs at a specified ratio.