Simple, rapid and sensitive spectrophotometric methods were developed for the determination of carbamazepine and mosapride citrate drugs in pure and pharmaceutical dosage forms. These methods are based on ion pair and charge transfer complexation reactions. The first method is based on the reaction of the carbamazepine drug with Mo(V)–thiocyanate in hydrochloric acid medium followed by an extraction of the coloured ion-pair with 1,2-dichloroethane and the absorbance of the ion pair was measured at 470 nm. The second method is based on the formation of ion-pairs between mosapride citrate and two dyestuff reagents namely bromothymol blue (BTB) and bromocresol green (BCG) in a universal buffer of pH 4 and 3, respectively. The formed ion-pairs are extracted with chloroform and methylene chloride and measured at 412 and 416 nm for BTB and BCG reagents, respectively. The third method is based on charge transfer complex formation between mosapride citrate (electron donor) and DDQ (π-acceptor reagent) and the absorbance of the CT complexes was measured at 450 nm. All the optimum conditions are established. The calibration graphs are rectilinear in the concentration ranges 10–350 for carbamazepine using Mo(V)–thiocyanate and 4–100, 4–60 and 10–150 μg mL−1 for mosapride citrate using BTB, BCG and DDQ reagents, respectively. The Sandell sensitivity (S), molar absorptivity, correlation coefficient, regression equations and limits of detection (LOD) and quantification (LOQ) are calculated. The law values of standard deviation (0.04–0.09 for carbamazepine using Mo(V)–thiocyanate and 0.022–0.024, 0.013–0.018 and 0.013–0.020 for mosapride citrate using BTB, BCG and DDQ, respectively) and relative standard deviation (0.630–2.170 for carbamazepine using Mo(V)–thiocyanate and 0.123–1.43, 0.102–0.530 and 0.226–1.280 for mosapride citrate using BTB, BCG and DDQ, respectively) reflect the accuracy and precision of the proposed methods. The methods are applied for the assay of the two investigated drugs in pharmaceutical dosage forms. The results are in good agreement with those obtained by the official method.