On-line measurement of birefringence was performed in the high-speed melt spinning process of poly(ethylene terephthalate) using an apparatus that incorporates a rotating polarizer for the measurement of the optical retardation of running filament. Particular attention was paid to the detailed measurements in the vicinity of neck-like deformation. Through the measurement at the take-up velocity of 5 km/min, development of birefringence under the strain rate up to about 1 ms(-1) was investigated. To analyze the relation between applied stress and birefringence, tension and temperature profiles of the spin-line were calculated based on the experimentally obtained diameter profiles. Even though the strain rate is extremely high, a linear relationship between birefringence and a parameter calculated by dividing stress by temperature was confirmed to hold up to birefringence and stress/temperature values of about 0.017 and 10 kPa/K, respectively.