This paper proposes a carrier-based pulse width modulation (PWM) method to control an indirect matrix converter (IMC) by analyzing the relationship between the space vector PWM (SVPWM) and the carrier-based PWM. The complexity of the SVPWM method for an IMC can be reduced by using an equivalent carrier-based PWM method. The advantage of the proposed algorithm is its ability use only one symmetrical triangular carrier signal to generate the gate signals for all of the power switches in both the rectifier and inverter stages as compared to the conventional method where the carrier signal used in the rectifier stage is different from that of the inverter stage. In addition, by using a suitable offset voltage component in the modulation signals, the output voltage magnitude reaches 0.866 of the input voltage magnitude. Simulation and experimental results are provided in order to validate the proposed method.