A method and apparatus for detecting symbols in a Multiple-Input Multiple-Output Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (“MIMO-OFDM”) system. A MIMO-OFDM receiver includes a first detector that estimates a symbol of a first MIMO-OFDM sub-carrier and a second detector that estimates a symbol of a second MIMO-OFDM sub-carrier. The second detector differs in complexity from the first detector. A detector control block is coupled to the detectors. The detector control block assigns the first detector to process the first MIMO-OFDM sub-carrier and assigns the second detector to process the second MIMO-OFDM sub-carrier. The detector control block computes a list metric for a sub-carrier. Based on the list metric the detector control block assigns a candidate symbol list length to the detector processing the sub-carrier. Alternately, the detector control block assigns one of a variety of detector types to a sub-carrier based on the sub-carrier list metric.