A method for configuring component carriers in carrier aggregation, comprising: user equipment receiving a configuration message of the component carriers; performing a random access on all or part of the component carriers (S 102), and determining, according to a result of the random access, whether the component carriers are successfully configured; wherein the configuration message comprises one of: a component carrier allocation message of adding one or more component carriers, a component carrier activation message of adding one or more component carriers and a component carrier activation command of adding one or more component carriers, each message being sent from a base station to the UE; characterized by the UE receiving the component carrier allocation message/the component carrier activation message in the configuration message of the component carriers further comprises: based on whether the component carrier allocation message/the component carrier activation message is configured with dedicated random access resources on the one or more component carriers, or based on an indication of whether a timing advance of each of the one or more component carriers in the component carrier allocation message/the component carrier activation message is consistent with a corresponding serving component carrier, determining whether or not random access needs to be performed on the one or more component carriers; wherein the UE receiving the component carrier activation command in the configuration message of the component carriers comprises: based on whether the component carrier activation command is configured with dedicated random access resources on the one or more component carriers, or based on an indication of whether a timing advance of each of the one or more component carriers in the component carrier activation command is consistent with a corresponding serving component, determining whether or not random access needs to be performed on the one or more component carriers. user equipment receiving a configuration message of the component carriers; performing a random access on all or part of the component carriers (S 102), and determining, according to a result of the random access, whether the component carriers are successfully configured; wherein the configuration message comprises one of: a component carrier allocation message of adding one or more component carriers, a component carrier activation message of adding one or more component carriers and a component carrier activation command of adding one or more component carriers, each message being sent from a base station to the UE; characterized by the UE receiving the component carrier allocation message/the component carrier activation message in the configuration message of the component carriers further comprises: based on whether the component carrier allocation message/the component carrier activation message is configured with dedicated random access resources on the one or more component carriers, or based on an indication of whether a timing advance of each of the one or more component carriers in the component carrier allocation message/the component carrier activation message is consistent with a corresponding serving component carrier, determining whether or not random access needs to be performed on the one or more component carriers; wherein the UE receiving the component carrier activation command in the configuration message of the component carriers comprises: based on whether the component carrier activation command is configured with dedicated random access resources on the one or more component carriers, or based on an indication of whether a timing advance of each of the one or more component carriers in the component carrier activation command is consistent with a corresponding serving component, determining whether or not random access needs to be performed on the one or more component carriers.