An image noise reduction method and apparatus to be used to digitize and process an image signal. Level values of peripheral pixels and the level value of a watched pixel are input into eight comparators and the value "1" is output when absolute values of differences between the level values are smaller than the value of a reference level. Signals output from the comparators are supplied to four AND circuits. The signals output from the AND circuits are supplied to eight AND gates in accordance with each combination and level values of corresponding peripheral pixels. Signals output from the AND circuits are supplied to an adder and the value "1" is added to the multiplication value and output to an output port-4. Thereby, the averaging operation is performed by using only pixels which solves the problem that an averaged signal phase is deviated from an original position.