According to the operating characteristics of pump applications, they should exhibit high efficiency and energy saving capabilities throughout the whole operating process. A novel efficiency optimization control strategy is presented here to meet the high efficiency demand of a variable speed Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor (PMSM). The core of this strategy is the excellent integration of mended maximum torque to the current control algorithm, based on the losses model during the dynamic and the grade search method with changed step by fuzzy logic during the steady. The performance experiments for the control system of a variable speed high efficiency PMSM have been completed. The test results verified that the system can reliably operate with a different control strategy during dynamic and steady operation, and the system exhibits better performance when using the efficiency-optimization control.