In this paper, an equalization concept for the novel radio access scheme Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE) is proposed by which high performance can be obtained at moderate computational complexity. Because high-level modulation is employed in EDGE, optimum equalization as usually performed in Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) receivers is too complex and suboptimum schemes have to be considered. It is shown that delayed decision-feedback sequence estimation (DDFSE) and reduced-state sequence estimation (RSSE) are promising candidates. For various channel profiles, approximations for the bit error rate of these suboptimum equalization techniques are given and compared with simulation results for DDFSE. It turns out that a discrete-time prefilter creating a minimum-phase overall impulse response is indispensible for a favorable tradeoff between performance and complexity. Additionally, the influence of channel estimation and of the receiver input filter is investigated and the reasons for performance degradation compared to the additive white Gaussian noise channel are indicated. Finally, the overall system performance attainable with the proposed equalization concept is determined for transmission with channel coding.