The invention discloses a variable-speed rolling bearing fault recognition method based on an order enveloping time-frequency energy spectrum. Short time Fourier transform is carried out on low-band signals in acquired rolling bearing vibration signals under a variable speed to acquire a short time spectrum, and in combination of a peak search method, instantaneous rotating frequency estimation for a bearing reference axis harmonic component is acquired; then, through a fast kurtosis spectrum technique, the optimum resonance frequency band pass parameters of the vibration signals are determined, the band pass signals after band pass filtering are subjected to Hilbert transform to acquire enveloping signals, and through short time Fourier transform, an enveloping time-frequency energy matrix is obtained; and an extraction interval is set, an order enveloping energy calculation path is obtained, order enveloping time-frequency energy in different orders is calculated through the energy calculation path and the enveloping time-frequency energy matrix, an order enveloping time-frequency energy spectrum is acquired, and through comparison between the order corresponding to the maximum order enveloping time-frequency energy and a fault order, bearing fault recognition is realized. The method has the advantages that the calculation efficiency is high, and requirements of real-time monitoring in actual engineering application can be met.