The present invention provides a method for measuring switching time of an Ethernet ring network, which comprises the following steps: synchronizing a local time of each node in the Ethernet ring network (301); when switching occurs in the Ethernet ring network, each node recording its own start time of the switching and end time of the switching (302); comparing all the time of the switching to obtain a maximum end time of the switching and a minimum start time of the switching among all the nodes, and calculating a difference between the maximum end time of the switching and the minimum start time of the switching (303) to serve as the switching time of the Ethernet ring network. The present invention also provides an apparatus for measuring switching time of the Ethernet ring network. By applying the method and apparatus, the switching time of the Ethernet ring network can be measured precisely, which facilitates the maintenance, fault location and service influence estimation etc. of the Ethernet ring network.