The present invention provides a method and device for message retransmission. The method comprises: constructing a first status report by a receiving terminal according to a message to be retransmitted, reading a message serial number of a truncated NACK which is truncated by an available bandwidth from the first status report, calculating a difference value between a front edge serial number of a receiving window of the receiving terminal and the message serial number of the truncated NACK, comparing the difference value with a given threshold, and taking a part before a truncation site as a second status report; constructing a third status report according to a comparison result and the second status report; sending the third status report by the receiving terminal; and retransmitting the message by a sending terminal according to the received third status report. The device for message retransmission is also provided, and comprises a threshold comparison module, a status report constructing module, a status report sending module and a retransmission module. By the method and device, it is achieved that under various status situations of the data transmission window, the air interface data transmission may be performed in time and the data transmission speed and efficiency are improved.