A turbo decoder iteratively decodes a received, encoded signal with one or more constituent decoders employing a simplified log-maximum a posteriori (SMAP) decoding algorithm. The SMAP decoding algorithm calculates reliability information as a log likelihood ratio for a log-MAP algorithm using a reduced set of path metrics recursively updated based on maximum likelihood recursion. Updated extrinsic information for a subsequent decoding may be derived from the LLR calculated by the SMAP decoding algorithm.