The present invention provides a network device and a method for allocating an access point name. The network device includes: a receiving module, configured to receive a user activation request sent by user equipment UE, where the user activation request includes user location information ULI; a parsing module, configured to parse the ULI received by the receiving module, to acquire an area code of a location of the UE; a determining module, configured to determine an area code set to which the area code acquired by the parsing module belongs; and an acquiring module, configured to acquire, according to a mapping relationship between the area code and an actual access point name APN, the actual APN for the UE. The embodiments of the present invention can implement centralized management on UE based on a geographical area range.