The effect of heating rate on the microstructural evolution during sintering of PZT ceramics has been investigated. In case of PZT powder compacts containing excess of PbO, fast heating caused incomplete rearrangement of solid grains in a liquid, resulting in lower density and inhomogeneous pore shape ; on contrary, slow heating resulted in better densification. In contrast, in case of compacts without excess PbO, the densification was enhanced by fast heating due to suppression of the grain growth.