The present invention provides a method and a device for processing a structured document by steps of obtaining an access mode for a consuming party of the structured document to an element in the structured document, the element comprising tag and content; determining a compression rule based on the access mode, the compression rule specifying at least one element to be compressed and at least one element not to be compressed in the structured document; and replacing the at least one element to be compressed with a compressed element to form a compressed structured document, wherein the tag of the compressed element is a specific compression tag, and the content of the compressed element is a result of compressing the at least one element to be compressed.