The invention provides a method of controlling an endoscope in which an insert part having an imaging unit at a distal end is inserted through the body. The insert part includes a bending part capable of bending movement to make an imaging direction of the imaging unit variable. The method implements amount-of-insertion detection processing to detect an amount of insertion of the insert part through the body, and implements bending part control processing on the basis of an amount of insertion detected by the amount-of-insertion detection processing to determine whether the bending part is to be bent or not on the basis of operation of a direction input part.
