The invention relates to an active noise reduction system for an engine in an automobile. The system comprises two error microphones, five secondary sound source loudspeakers and one self-adaptation active controller. The two error microphones are arranged at automobile roof positions corresponding to a front row and a back row of the automobile. The five secondary sound source loudspeakers are composed of four vehicle-mounted loudspeaker boxes arranged on the automobile door sides and one secondary sound source arranged at the position of a rear row partition plate. The self-adaptation active controller comprises a DSP master control chip, an audio decoding chip, an off-chip storage unit, a CAN bus controller, a power amplifier, an error microphone signal receiving module, a secondary sound source output module and a power module. The invention further relates to an active noise reduction method for the engine in the automobile. By means of the system and method, error noise signals in active noise reduction reach the minimum value during constant noise reduction control, the noise influence caused by the error noise signals can be basically ignored, and the expected noise reduction effect can be rapidly achieved.