The present disclosure includes a system and method for symbol compression using conditional entropy estimation. One method for symbol compression using conditional entropy estimation includes approximating a quantity of symbol encoding bits for a number of symbols using a conditional entropy estimation. Dictionary entries are generated from the number of symbols so as to minimize a total bit-stream quantity. The total bit-stream quantity includes at least the approximated quantity of symbol encoding bits and a quantity of dictionary entries encoding bits. The symbols are encoded using the dictionary entries as a reference.