Prochlorperazine bismethanesulfonate (PCPMS) is proposed as a new sensitive and selective reagent for the spectrophotometric determination of microgram amounts of osmium. PCPMS forms a red-colored species with osmium(VIII) or osmium(VI) instantaneously at room temperature in 5 M phosphoric acid medium. The red species exhibits maximum absorbance at 529 nm. Beer's law is valid over the concentration range 0.05–3.6 ppm for osmium(VIII) and 0.15–6.4 ppm for osmium(VI). Sandell's sensitivity of the reaction is 2.89 nm cm −2 for osmium(VIII) and 4.24 ng cm −2 for osmium(VI). The effects of time, temperature, acidity, order of addition of reagents, reagent concentration, and diverse ions are investigated. The application of the proposed method in the determination of osmium content in synthetic ores has been explored.