Provided in embodiments of the present application are a method and terminal for handling channel state information (CSI). The embodiments use the terminal to measure and report to a base station first CSI, where the first CSI comprises a first rank indicator (RI), a first precoding matrix indicator (PMI), and a first channel quality indicator (CQI), to acquire a second RI and/or a second PMI on the basis of the first CSI. The terminal is able to utilize the second RI to measure and report to the base station the PMI and CQI corresponding to the second RI; or, utilize the second RI and the second PMI to measure and report to the base station the CQI corresponding to the second RI and to the second PMI; or, utilize the second PMI to measure and report to the base station the RI and CQI corresponding to the second PMI.