We present a systematic study of quantum receivers and modulation methods enabling resource efficient quantum-enhanced optical communication. We introduce quantum-inspired modulation schemes that theoretically yield a better resource efficiency than legacy protocols. Experimentally, we demonstrate below the shot-noise limit symbol error rates for M ≤ 16 legacy and quantum-inspired communication alphabets using software-configurable optical communication time-resolving quantum receiver testbed. Further, we experimentally verify that our quantum-inspired modulation schemes boost the accuracy of practical quantum measurements and significantly optimize the combined use of energy and bandwidth for communication alphabets that are longer than M = 4 symbols.