Aspects of the disclosure provide a network device. The network device includes a search engine, a ternary content addressable memory (TCAM) cache engine, a search key generation unit and an output controller. The search engine stores a lookup table of entries for rules of packet processing, and searches the lookup table in response to packets received from a network interface of the network device. The TCAM cache engine caches a subset of the entries in the lookup table based on hit statistics of the entries. The search key generation unit generates a search key based on a received packet and provides the search key to the search engine and to the TCAM cache engine. The output controller outputs a search result from the TCAM cache engine when the TCAM cache engine has a matching entry to the search key.