A unified codec device and method are disclosed. A decoding device includes a decoding description decoder, generating at least one table by using inputted decoding description; and a codec unit, decoding and outputting encoded video data, included in an inputted bit-stream, to moving picture data by using the table. With the present invention, a bit-stream, encoded by various formats according to each standard (e.g. MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and MPEG-4 AVC), can be decoded by the same information recognizing method.