Simple and economical UV spectrophotometric methods by second order and third order derivative have been developed for the estimation of alprazolam in bulk and its tablet formulation. The standard and sample solutions of alprazolam were prepared in 0.1N hydrochloric acid. Alprazolam was estimated at 234 nm for the second order derivative and at 220 nm for third order derivative methods. Beer’s law was obeyed in the concentration range of 1 to 12 μg / ml with coefficient of correlation value 0.9994 for second order and 0.9996 for third order derivative method respectively. A validation of above methods was carried out as per ICH guidelines. The precision expressed as relative standard deviation were of 1.063978 % and 0.889569 % for the above two methods respectively. The proposed methods were easily applied for the estimation of alprazolam in pharmaceutical dosages forms. Results of the analysis were found to be satisfactory statistically. The proposed methods are simple, low-cost and require relatively inexpensive instruments.