Disclosed is a phase error estimating an apparatus and a method which provides improved convergence speed and tracking speed even in mobile channel environment by variably applying the step size for phase error estimation according to channel status. The apparatus for estimating a phase error includes: a posterior probability (APP) average calculating unit for calculating an APP average value from a soft decision result of a currently received symbol; a step size determining unit for determining a step size variably according to channel status; and a phase error estimating unit for estimating a phase error of the currently received symbol from a phase error of a previously received symbol and the APP average value by using the variably determined step size.