Provided is a method and apparatus for determining timing for initial ranging of user equipment by using ranging of adjacent pieces of user equipment in a multi-hop mobile relay (MMR) system, and more particularly, a method and apparatus for determining timing for initial ranging of user equipment in which a power value and a timing value for periodic ranging of adjacent pieces of user equipment are measured so as to minimize an uplink timing error of a base station. In the MMR system, user equipment transmits an initial ranging code to the base station with irregular timing while not knowing an exact start point of an uplink of the base station. In particular, if the user equipment attempts the initial ranging at the same time as when adjacent pieces of user equipment attempt the periodic ranging and the handover ranging, an error occurs between transmission timing of the initial ranging and uplink timing, thereby acting as an inter-symbol interference (ISI) and inter-channel interference (ICI) of different ranging. As a result, the initial ranging acts as an interference signal in a ranging process of adjacent pieces of user equipment. However, the apparatus and method can minimize a timing error of the initial ranging code of user equipment by avoiding the initial ranging acting as the interference signal.