A novel three-phase quasi-resonant dc link inverter (QRI)with a switch connected between dc voltage source and resonant inductor is proposed. According to the state of switching and load current, the operating mode of the proposed inverter scheme is classified into free-wheeling, inverting, and rectifying mode. By examining the behavior of the circuit in each operating mode, an equivalent circuit which represents all the modes in a unified manner is derived. The operating principle of QRI at inverting mode is analyzed, and it is shown that the maximum voltage of resonant dc link is confined to twice the dc source voltage and that both the zero voltage switching of inverter and the zero current switching of inserted switch are guaranteed. An appropriate current control algorithm is suggested, and the opeating characteristics of proposed resonant inverter are verified through both simulation and experiment.