Edge detection operation is a method to detect the presence of object image that commonly used in the field of image processing. The most well known technique for edge detection is gradient-based. There are number of methods that have been used to make an implementation of a gradient-based edge detection algorithm design. This paper proposes a design and implementation of gradient based edge detection algorithm using of Sobel operator. An image is captured by a CMOS camera and converted into grayscale to obtain image intensity for edge detection. The Sobel edge detection operator is controlled by Finite State Machine (FSM) which executes a matrix area gradient operation to determine the level of variance through different of pixels and display the result on a monitor. The whole process is performed in the hardware level and implemented on an Altera field programmable gate array platform. The result shows good performance of edge detection with 27MHz clock operation which is able to detect just within 2ms. © 2009 IEEE.