A method and apparatus for determining the data rate of a reverse link communication of an access terminal includes receiving a reverse activity bit (RAB) from an access network in the communication system, and passing the RAB to multiple digital filters to produce filtered RABs. The reverse link data rate is determined based on these filtered values of the RABs. From the filtered RAB values a continuous fluid power level is determined each rate update. The access terminal maps the continuous fluid power level to actual physical transmissions by dithering among discrete power levels allowed by the physical layer.