An apparatus and method for protection switching are disclosed. The protection switching method in accordance with an example of the present disclosure is capable of smoothly processing a protection switching while preventing a data path mismatch occurring in the protection switching in a case in which a forced switching command (FS), which is a passive command, and a signal failure (SF) of a protection path occur at both end nodes, respectively, when a linear protection switching is performed by use of a protection state coordination message in a packet network or a packet transport network.