receiving, by a terminal device, random access preamble configuration information and Doppler reference information, wherein the random access preamble configuration information comprises at least two pieces of random access preamble format information and random access preamble time-frequency resource information corresponding to the random access preamble format information, the Doppler reference information indicates to divide a preset coverage area of a network device into at least two sub-coverage areas, and the preset coverage area comprises one or more beams;

determining, by the terminal device based on a target sub-coverage area to which the terminal device belongs in the preset coverage area of the network device, target random access preamble format information corresponding to the target sub-coverage area, wherein the preset coverage area comprises one or more beams, and the preset coverage area comprises at least two sub-coverage areas; and

sending, by the terminal device to the network device on a target time-frequency resource corresponding to target random access preamble time-frequency resource information, a random access preamble corresponding to the target random access preamble format information.