The present disclosure provides a method and an apparatus for random access in a wireless communication system, as well as a user terminal. The method includes: receiving indication information transmitted from a radio base station, the indication information instructing a user terminal to initiate a random access; determining a target Physical Random Access Channel (PRACH) resource from available resources based on a current coverage level and resource information carried in the indication information, the target PRACH resource being used for transmitting a PRACH signal for initiating the random access; and re-determining, in response to a failure to initiate the random access over the target PRACH resource, the target PRACH resource from the available resources based on an updated coverage level and the resource information, and transmitting the PRACH signal over the re-determined target PRACH resource. The present disclosure can solve the technical problem in the related art associated with low success rate of random accesses initiated by radio base stations.