A method and apparatus for controlling buffering of an audio stream so that audio can be played continuously without stoppage using a minimum amount of buffering are provided. The method for controlling buffering of data includes (a) determining a buffering period of compressed audio data on the basis of a time stamp which corresponds to a packet division unit, by considering the state of a network, (b) calculating a time period where the compressed audio data is to be stored in a buffer, on the basis of the buffering period that is determined in step (a), (c) buffering the inputted compressed audio data in a decoding buffer for the time period that is calculated in step (b), and (d) decoding the compressed audio data that is stored in the decoding buffer when the time period passes in step (c) and storing the decoded audio data in a composition buffer for synchronization with video data.