Disclosed are a method and apparatus for an adaptive HTTP streaming service using media content metadata. The media content consist of a series of periods. The metadata may include a start time attribute and/or a duration attribute for each period. The metadata may determine a start time of each period and a start time of each segment contained in each period. A terminal accesses the segments contained in each period, and performs decoding and rendering processes on the data of the media content contained in the segments, thereby reproducing the media content.