A rapid, selective and accurate high-performance liquid chromatography method (HPLC) for the determination of diltiazem hydrochloride using clonazepam as internal standard is developed. The investigated compounds were eluted from 5 u Micropak MCH-5 reversed phase column at ambient temperature with a mobile phase comprising of acetonitrile-water (48:52%) at pH 3.3 and containing 0. 01M sodium-n-octane sulfonate as an ion pairing substance. The mobile phase was pumped at a flow rate of 1 ml min−1and the effluent was monitored at 239 nm. The retention times of the internal standard and diltiazem were at 3 min and 9 min, respectively. A linear relationship was derived between the peak height ratio (diltiazem/clonazepam) and diltiazem concentration over the range 1–10 μg ml−1. Detection limit for the drug is 0.2 μg ml−1at 0.01 aufs. The developed procedure was applied to study the stability of diltiazem in the presence of its degradation products as well as in the presence of formulation excipients.