The application pertains to a method for communicating downlink control information. A base station maps an enhanced physical downlink control channel (E-PDCCH) sequentially to resource elements for transmitting the E-PDCCH in each orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) symbol according to an order of OFDM symbols used by the E-PDCCH of a user equipment (UE). The E-PDCCH is sent to the UE from the base station by using the resource elements, where the E-PDCCH and a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) invoked by the E-PDCCH are frequency-division multiplexed. Because the E-PDCCH is mapped sequentially to resource elements for transmitting the E-PDCCH in each OFDM symbol according to an order of OFDM symbols used by the E-PDCCH of the UE, different control channel elements of E-PDCCHs at different aggregation levels will not include a same E-PDCCH modulation symbol, thereby ensuring that the UE judges a start position of the E-PDCCH correctly.