In this correspondence, a fast motion estimation algorithm, based on the successive elimination algorithm (SEA) of Li and Salari (1995), is studied. This fast motion estimation algorithm finds the same displacement vectors as the exhaustive search algorithm with a reduced computational load. A modified fast motion estimation algorithm introducing negligible distortion into a transform coder, but providing for a further computational load reduction, is developed. Implementation issues are also discussed and compared. Results show that the number of searching operations can be reduced dramatically with the help of fast motion estimation algorithms.