This application provides a traffic classification method and apparatus. The method includes: determining, based on distribution characteristics of concerned bits of a plurality of rules in a first rule set, an effective bit corresponding to the first rule set; determining a hash key value of each rule based on a value of the effective bit of each rule in the first rule set, and storing each rule in the first rule set in at least one of S storage units based on the hash key value, where the first rule set is any one of N rule sets, the N rule sets are stored in the S storage units; and when traffic classification is performed, searching for a corresponding rule in each of the S storage units based on a hash key value of a search key.