By using a surfactant ion-selective membrane electrode, the kinetics of binding of cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide with deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) were studied. The binding followed first-order kinetics and appeared to occur in three stages for native DNA. Denatured DNA (caused by heat, acid and alkali) exhibited two-stage first-order kinetics. The multi-stage rate constants followed the order k 1 >k 2 >k 3 or k 1 >k 2 ; they were energetically well separated. The three-stage kinetics at ionic strength μ=0.05 was reduced to a two-stage one at μ=0.001. The enthalpies of activation of all three stages were low whereas the entropy values were reasonably high, and varied in a narrow range. The ΔH <TΔS manifestation suggested the kinetic process to be essentially entropy controlled. An isokinetic enthalpy-entropy compensation phenomenon was observed.