An image coding apparatus reduces arithmetic processing and includes an intermediate stream generating unit generating an intermediate stream, by generating an intermediate code from image data, coding header information among coding conditions for image coding, and synthesizing the generated intermediate code and the coded header information. The image coding apparatus also includes a coded stream generating unit outputting a coded stream, by performing variable length coding on the intermediate code included in the intermediate stream to generate coded image data, and synthesizing the generated coded image data and the header information, and includes a parameter information extracting unit extracting, from among the coding conditions, parameter information required for performing variable length coding on the intermediate code. The coded stream generating unit generates the coded image data by performing the variable length coding on the intermediate code using the parameter information extracted by the parameter information extracting unit.