Embodiments of the present invention disclose a random access response receiving and sending method, a user equipment, a base station, and a system. The method includes: after sending a dedicated random access preamble to a network side, on a physical downlink control channel, according to a pre-obtained dedicated identifier, detecting control signaling masked by using the dedicated identifier, where the dedicated identifier is a user equipment-specific temporary identifier configured by the network side for the user equipment, and the control signaling includes information about a physical downlink shared channel used to send a random access response and information required for decoding the random access response; and receiving the random access response on a corresponding physical downlink shared channel according to the control signaling.