A method and system (102) for providing criterion based adaptive power allocation with selective determination of modulation and coding is provided. A method is presented which consists of providing adaptive power allocation with a target signal quality for each link based on a system criterion, and a modulation/coding rate for each link based on a signal quality associated with the transmit power of each link. A further method is provided which may alternatively, or additionally, consist of APA in which the transmit power for each link is assigned in an attempt to obtain a signal quality for each link within a range between or equal to a minimum and maximum. An additional method is disclosed consisting of APA in which the transmit power for each link is assigned in an attempt to obtain a signal quality for each link as close as possible to a common signal quality, when the power allocation method has a limited dynamic range. The method and system (102) of the present invention may be implemented in a wireless communication system (100) in any number of formats, such as code division multiple access or time division multiple access.