There is disclosed a character recognition machine adapted to recognize Japanese characters such as kanjis and kanas. The machine comprises a character string storage portion, a character extraction portion, a character recognition portion, and a language processing portion. A character string to be recognized is stored as an image in the storage portion. The character extraction portion comprises a network consisting a plurality of interconnected operators each of which has numerous inputs and outputs. An evaluation function which assumes its minimum value when a character extraction produces the best results is calculated by the operators simultaneously so as to minimize the value of the function. The character recognition portion calculates degrees of similarity of a character pattern to various character categories, the character pattern being applied from the character extraction portion. The language processing portion receives these degrees of similarity and selects a character category which seems to provide the most correct combination of characters in terms of vocabulary and grammar.