In a dielectric ceramic having crystal grains and containing a perovskite in which the A site contains Ba and the B site contains Ti. as a main component, the crystal orientations are aligned in substantially the same direction within the crystal grains. Some of Ba may be replaced with Ca and/or Sr, and some of Ti may be replaced with Zr and/pr Hf. This achieves a dielectric ceramic which has a high dielectric constant and has favorable AC electric field characteristics in which the change in dielectric constant is small even with changes in applied electric field.