OBJECTIVE To estimate experimental log P values of formerly described 5-formyl- and 5-acyl-dithiole-3-thiones (DTT) and -dithiole-3-ones (DTO) and to check the validity of five log P calculation programs via experimental log P for a database of 68 DTT and DTO. METHODS Experimental log P values were measured by means of octanol/water partitioning; for determining solute concentrations in water, RP-HPLC with spectrophotometric detection was used. For calculating log P, the fragmental methods ACD/log P, CLOGP, and KOWWIN, the atom-based approach XLOGP, and the whole-molecule approach QLOGP were applied. RESULTS Quality of calculations significantly differs depending on the subset under consideration. For database compounds 01-48, comprising alkyl and aryl substitution in 4- and 5-position, the fragmental methods ACD/log P, CLOGP, and KOWWIN perform significantly better than the atom-based approach XLOGP and the whole-molecule method QLOGP. For database compounds 49-68, comprising formyl and acyl substitution in 4- and 5-position, superiority of the whole-molecule method QLOGP over the substructure-based approaches is observed. The strong underestimation of log P for compounds 49-68 probably indicates hidden physicochemical phenomena resulting from the juxtaposition of the acyl and dithiole moieties. CONCLUSIONS All calculation methods included in this study need a thorough refinement to adequately cope with particular solvation behavior suspected to prevail in formyl- or acyl-DTT and DTO, which represent a chemical class of high pharmacological interest.