This disclosure provides methods and apparatuses for generating precoding vectors. One method includes: receiving a channel state information (CSI) report, wherein the CSI report indicates a quantity of space-frequency vector pairs to be reported for a quantity of R transport layers, wherein a size of an overhead for indicating the quantity of the space-frequency vector pairs is same when the quantity of R is greater than or equal to 2, wherein each of the space-frequency vector pairs comprises one spatial domain vector and one frequency domain vector, and wherein for each of the R transport layers, one or more frequency domain units associated with the transport layer correspond to one or more precoding vectors, and determining the quantity of space-frequency vector pairs according to the CSI report.