Primaquine (PQ) is the only 8-aminoquinoline antimalarial drug in clinical use because of its unique action on hypnozoites and gametocytes of Plasmodium species. We report here simple, sensitive and specific assay methods for the determination of PQ in human whole blood and dried blood spot (DBS) samples using high-performance liquid chromatography and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry, respectively. Sample preparation was performed by a single or two-step liquid-liquid extraction with organic solvents. For whole blood analysis, separation was obtained on a reversed-phase C18 column with the mobile phase consisting of 0.25 % diethylamine and acetonitrile (7:3, v:v) running at a flow rate of 1.0 ml min−1. UV detection was at the wavelength 263 nm. For DBS analysis, separation was obtained on a reversed-phase column with the mobile phase consisting of methanol and 0.1 formic acid (1:3, v:v) running at a flow rate of 0.5 ml min−1. The selected ions generated by electrospray ionization were detected using mass spectrometer. Good precision and accuracy (both within-day and day-to-day assays) were obtained at the concentration ranges under investigation. Limits of quantification for PQ were accepted as 25 ng ml−1 using 500 μl whole blood and 5 ng ml−1 using 80 μl DBS samples. The mean recoveries for PQ and internal standard pyrimethamine (PYR) for both whole blood and DBS were over 70 %. The methods were successfully applied for a clinical pharmacology study of PQ in patients with Plasmodium vivax. Excellent correlation (r 2 = 0.997) was observed between the analysis of PQ in paired whole blood and DBS samples.