BACKGROUND: Induced sputum (IS) using the cytospin technique has been extensively employed to characterize inflammatory airway diseases; however, procedures of cell enrichment based on cytospin increase the analytical costs and require slide processing within a short period of time after sampling. STUDY OBJECTIVES: To compare three different techniques for cytologic analysis of IS, and to determine the time required by each method and the costs involved. DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. SETTING: Tertiary-care university hospital. PATIENTS AND MEASUREMENTS: Eighty-nine patients with asthma and 11 subjects without asthma were submitted to increasing hypertonic saline solution concentrations of 2, 3, 4, and 5% for 7 min for sputum induction. Samples were smeared without treatment with 0.1% dithiothreitol (DTT) [technique A], after treatment with DTT (technique B), and after treatment with DTT and cytospin (technique C). All slides were air-dried and stained with Leishman stain. Two independent observers counted at least 200 inflammatory cells on each slide. RESULTS: Eighty percent of the slides processed by techniques A and B and 65% of the slides processed by technique C represented sputum samples of acceptable quality. The eosinophil percentages in sputum obtained by techniques A and C were closely correlated, as also were those obtained by techniques B and C (r = 0.64 and r = 0.63, respectively; p < 0.01). There was a positive correlation for eosinophils when we compared techniques A and B (r = 0.57, p < 0.01). The neutrophil correlation was significant when the three techniques were compared (technique A vs technique B, r = 0.66; technique A vs technique C, r = 0.51; and technique B vs technique C, r = 0.57; p < 0.01). Bland-Altman analysis showed a good agreement for eosinophil and neutrophil counts when techniques A and B were compared to technique C. CONCLUSIONS: The three techniques are good indicators of lung inflammation. Techniques A and B are less time consuming and are of lower cost.