The sodium-lithium (Na+-Li+) exchange and sodium-potassium (Na+-K+) cotransport activities were assessed on erythrocytes of 38 normotensive individuals, 18 patients with well-established essential hypertension, and five renal hypertensive patients, by means of an uptake assay method. With both transport systems, no significant differences in mean values and variance were observed among the three groups. Four of six low-renin essential hypertensive patients exhibited some of the lowest exchange and cotransport rates obtained among all individuals examined. The activity of both transport systems was slightly lower in women than in men.