An apparatus for generating a multi-view face descriptor includes a multi-view face database storing sets of training face images and sets of test face images, each set including a mosaic view of a single identity; a basis matrix generator generating a basis matrix of the training face images shown from respective viewpoints searched from the multi-view face database; a feature extractor extracting feature vectors of a test face image shown from each viewpoint using the basis matrix of the training face images searched from the multi-view face database; a to-be-registered view selector searching the test face images using the feature vectors extracted by the feature extractor and selecting a plurality of viewpoints as registered viewpoints according to the search results; and a face descriptor generator generating a multi-view face descriptor by synthesizing face descriptors having the plurality of selected viewpoints.