A vehicle periphery monitoring apparatus displays a detection line on a display unit, with side portions of the detection line positioned on far-off spots that are farther than a spot on which a center portion of the detection line is positioned. In addition, based on the distance of the respective spots on which the portions of the detection line are positioned, the apparatus includes a parameter table that defines different parameters for a short distance portion, a middle distance portion, and a long distance portion of the detection line. The apparatus detects a moving object based on an actual-detected brightness change of a pixel along the detection line and a predefined brightness change of a pixel along the detection line that is defined by the parameter of the parameter table.