A stereo encoding method and apparatus are provided, so as to reduce distortion caused by delay adjustment. The stereo encoding method includes: extracting a current interchannel delay of a stereo signal and a previous delay adjacent to the current interchannel delay; performing adjustment frame judgment according to characteristics of the current stereo signal when the current delay and the previous delay are different; and performing delay adjustment on the stereo signal by using the current interchannel delay if it is judged that a frame where the current delay occurs is an adjustment frame.