Three rapid and sensitive, colorimetric and atomic absorption spectrometric methods were developed for the determination of aztreonam. The proposed methods depend upon the reaction of cobaltthiocyanate (I) or reineckate (II) ions with the drug to form stable ion-pair complexes which extractable with chloroform. The greenish blue and pink color complexes are determined either colorimetrically at lambda(max) 625 and 525 nm for I and II reagents, respectively, or by atomic absorption spectrometry, directly using the organic extracted complex, or indirectly, using the supernatant. The three procedures are applied for the determination of aztreonam in pure and in pharmaceutical dosage forms applying the standard additions technique and the results obtained agreed well with those obtained by the official method.