Compressing state transition instructions may achieve a reduction in the binary instruction footprint of a state machine. In certain embodiments, the compressed state transition instructions are used by state machine engines that use one or more caches in order to increase the speed at which the state machine engine can execute a state machine. In addition to reducing the instruction footprint, the use of compressed state transition instructions as discussed herein may also increase the cache hit rate of a cache-based state machine engine, resulting in an increase in performance.