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Instantaneous frequency (IF) of shaft rotation is pivotal for bearing fault diagnosis under variable speed operations. However, shaft IF cannot always be measured as tachometers are not allowed to be installed in every case due to design reasons and cost concerns. Extracting the shaft IF ridge from time frequency representation (TFR) of vibration signals, therefore, becomes an alternative. Linear transform (LT), such as short time Fourier transform (STFT), has been widely adopted for such a purpose. Nevertheless, the accuracy of extracted IF ridges relies on the readability of TFR. Unfortunately, readability of TFR from STFT is often impaired by the smearing effect caused by non-synchronous frequencies between bases and signal components and limited time frequency resolution capability, which in turn adversely influences the accuracy of IF ridge extraction. To accurately extract IF ridges from vibration signals, this paper focuses on the first factor, which causes the smearing problem, and proposes a method named frequency matching linear transform (FMLT) to enhance the TFR, where transforming bases with frequencies varying with the shaft IF are constructed to alleviate the smearing effects. To construct the transforming bases with frequencies synchronous with shaft IF, a fast path optimization (FPO) algorithm, which generates all possible optimization paths among amplitude peaks and thereby ensures the continuity of extracted IF ridges, is adopted for IF pre-estimation. The TFR with improved readability can be subsequently obtained via FMLT, paving the way for accurate IF ridge extraction. Then, multiple IF ridges can be iteratively extracted using the FPO algorithm. The accuracy of extracted IF ridges before and after TFR enhancement is compared, indicating that the proposed FMLT can enhance the readability of TFR and lead to more accurate IF ridge extraction for bearing condition monitoring.