Embodiments provide a communication method, a network side device, and a terminal device. When a quantity of minimum scheduling time units in one time of scheduling performed by a network side device is S, and the network side device and a terminal device transmit data in a first transmission mode, a target scheduling rule can be determined by the terminal device from N scheduling rules. The scheduling rule includes at least one of a quantity T of transport blocks in one time of scheduling and a mapping relationship between T transport blocks and S minimum scheduling time units in one time of scheduling. The first transmission mode is a single-antenna transmission scheme or a multi-antenna transmission scheme. Communication can be performed, by the network side device, with the terminal device according to the target scheduling rule. In this way, proper scheduling rules can be selected to adapt to different scenarios.