The present application provides a flow table-based table entry addressing method, a switch, and a controller. The method includes: receiving, by a switch, a packet; matching, by the switch, the packet based on a previous flow table; after matching is successful, sending, by the switch based on a write storage index instruction in a flow table entry that is successfully matched, storage index information along with the packet to a lower-level flow table, where, the storage index information corresponds to a flow table entry in the lower-level flow table, and the write storage index instruction is sent by a controller; and directly addressing, by the switch in the lower-level flow table based on the storage index information, the flow table entry corresponding to the storage index information.