Abstract: A speech compressor utilizing Trellis Encoding and Linear Prediction (TELP). A TELP speech compressor provides improved signal generation and search technique for a code-excited linear prediction (CELP) speech encoder. TELP is a frame oriented coding that breaks the quantized speech signals into frames of prescribed length N and each frame into subframes of prescribed length L, which are processed as dependent units utilizing an analysis-by-synthesis approach. The approach is based on constructing the best mean square linear predicting filter and searching the best exciting sequence for the filter in order to produce synthesized speech. A trellis encoder is used instead of a stochastic code book. The Q-ary analysis of a given subframe and previous excitations is proposed for a fast vector search in an adaptive code book. It simplifies the implementation of digital speech compression.