A processor core that includes a hardware decode unit and an execution engine unit. The hardware decode unit to decode a vector frequency expand instruction, wherein the vector frequency compress instruction includes a source operand and a destination operand, wherein the source operand specifies a source vector register that includes one or more pairs of a value and run length that are to be expanded into a run of that value based on the run length. The execution engine unit to execute the decoded vector frequency expand instruction which causes, a set of one or more source data elements in the source vector register to be expanded into a set of destination data elements comprising more elements than the set of source data elements and including at least one run of identical values which were run length encoded in the source vector register.