HEVC can increase the coding efficiency significantly compared with H.264/AVC however it requires much larger computational complexities in both encoder and decoder. In this paper, the decision process of inter-prediction modes in the HEVC reference software has been studied and a fast algorithm to reduce the computational complexity of encoder and decoder is introduced. The proposed scheme introduces a early decision criteria using the outputs of uni-directional predictions to skip the bi-directional prediction estimation. From the experimental results, it was proven that the proposed method can reduce the encoding complexity by 12.0%, 14.6% and 17.2% with 0.6%, 1.0% and 1.5% of coding efficiency penalty, respectively. In addition, the ratio of bi-directional prediction mode was reduced by 6.3%, 11.8% and 16.6% at the same level of coding efficiency penalty, respectively, which should lead to the decoder complexity reduction. Finally, the effects of the proposed scheme are maintained regardless of the use of the early skip decision algorithm which is implemented in the HEVC reference software. 부호화 및 복호화 과정의 복잡도가 크게 증가 하기 때문에 이를 감소시키기 위한 연구들이 활발하게 제 정규논문 (Regular Paper)