The invention discloses a laser lap welding gap detecting system and a laser lap welding gap detecting method based on molten pool image visual sensing. The detecting system is a visual sensing system and comprises a CMOS camera, a light filtering system, a secondary light source, an image capture card, a computer, a display and the like, wherein the CMOS camera has a LinLog photosensory technology. According to the detecting method, the secondary light source and emitted light of molten pools are used as light sources; plasma is filtered out by utilizing the light filtering system, and light intensity is adjusted; the computer is used for collecting and displaying molten pool images in real time, wherein the molten pool images are obtained by the CMOS camera; molten pool image edges and areas and orifice image edges and areas are extracted and calculated by utilizing a Labview image processing platform, and the quantitative relations between molten pool sizes and orifice areas and between the molten pool sizes and orifice gaps are obtained. The detecting system is simple in structure, clear in monitoring image, high in light signal detecting accuracy, strong in anti-jamming capacity, good in engineering practicability and capable of monitoring laser welding of T-type overlap joint gaps in real time.