Fractal image coding is an novel and an developed potential image compression technique based on the local self-similarities within real world images. However, the baseline fractal image coding is time consuming due to the best matching search between range blocks and numerous domain blocks. In order to reduce encoding times, the paper proposed an improved scheme for fractal image coding based on pixel sampling. The improved scheme not only does not need any complex theoretical analysis, but also does not need to change the existing fractal decoding procedure; thus it can bring in other fast fractal image encoding algorithms in a straightforward manner. Computer simulations on a set of standard images show that match searching time can be reduced substantially and the subject image quality remain unchanged basically, while the PSNR being decreased slightly.