Abstract: A novel cellular search (CS) algorithm for block-matching motion estimation is presented. Two different search patterns, namely the Large Cellular Search Pattern (LCSP) and the Small Cellular Search Pattern (SCSP), are employed to perform searching the best matching block. The LCSP assumes that the best matching block can be located at any direction of the LCSP center, and we show that the number of blocks via LCSP search is less than other algorithms. Following the LCSP search, the SCSP is used to search those nearby the center block. We show that the CS algorithm is computationally efficient, it requires less computation time than other algorithms such as the three-step search (TSS) [1], the new three-step search (NTSS) [2], and the four-step search (4SS) [3].