Acetonitrile is the simplest organic nitrile, usually also called as nitrile methyl cyanide and methane. It is a colorless transparent liquid at room temperature. It is highly volatile, with special smell like ether, and flammable with flame burning brightly. It is mutually soluble in water, methanol, carbon tetrachloride, methyl acetate, ethyl acetate, ethylene dichloride, and many other non-saturated hydrocarbon solvents. It is toxic and can be metabolized into hydrogen cyanide and thiocyanate. Acetonitrile is a good solvent with excellent performance and is an important organic intermediate. It is also widely used as a polar aprotic solvent. The biggest application of acetonitrile is as a solvent which can be used as the solvents for the synthesis of vitamin A, cortisone, carbon amine drugs and their intermediates solvent. It also used as an active medium solvent in the manufacture of vitamin B1 and amino acids. It can substitute chlorinated solvents as a vinyl coating, an extracting agent of fatty acid, a alcohol denaturant, the extracting agent of butadiene, and the solvent of acrylonitrile synthetic fibers. It also has a lot of applications in fabric dyeing, light industry, spice manufacturing, and photographic materials manufacturing.

Acetonitrile is the raw material for preparing orthoacetate. It is also used as the intermediate of producing DV-acid methyl ester and 2-chloro-3,3,3-trifluoro-1-propenyl-2,2-dimethyl cyclopropanecarboxylate. It can also be used as the raw materials of making pyrimidine derivatives which is the intermediate of sulfonylurea herbicides. Moreover, it can be used for making vitamin B1 in the field of pharmaceutical industry and as the extraction agent of C4 fraction in the synthetic rubber industry.

Used as nitrile rubber monomer; Used for pharmaceutical industry and extraction of carbon IV.
As standard reference in chromatographic analysis; also as solvent and stationary phase for gas chromatography.
The major application of acetonitrile is as a solvent such as solvents for butadiene extraction, solvent for synthetic fibers and solvents for some special paints. In the oil industry, acetonitrile is used as the solvent for removing tar, phenol and other substances from petroleum hydrocarbons. It is also used as the solvent for extracting fatty acids from vegetable and animal oil in the fatty acid industry, and used as the reaction medium of the recrystallization of steroidal drugs in medicine industry. The binary azeotropic mixtures of acetonitrile and water are often used when a polar solvent of high dielectric constant is demanded: containing 84% acetonitrile, boiling point: 76 °C. Acetonitrile is used as the intermediate of pharmaceutical (vitamin B1) and spices, as the raw materials for making the synergist of triazine nitrogenous fertilizer, and also as a denaturant for ethyl alcohol. Moreover, it can also be used for synthesizing ethylamine, acetic acid, etc., and have many applications in textile dyeing and light industry.
It is used as the solvent of most inorganic compounds. It is also used as the solvent for spectrophotometric measurement, as a non-aqueous solvent, and as the diluents for determination of the carboxyl group. Furthermore, it is also applied in recrystallization of steroids and extraction of fatty acid, and also used as the solvents of High pressure liquid chromatography (HPLC).