Indophenol blue colorimetry has been widely used for determining soil ammonia nitrogen, but this method has some disadvantages, such as complex reagent preparation, high toxicity, and long colorimetric time. Hence, we aimed to develop a rapid soil ammonia nitrogen determination method using a rapid detection kit. In order to select a suitable extractant, different concentrations of KCl and NaCl solutions were used to extract soil. The ammonia nitrogen content in different types of soils was determined using a rapid detection kit (purchased from Zhejiang Luheng Environmental Technology Limited Company) coupled with a microplate reader. The kit method was compared with the traditional indophenol blue colorimetry method. The results showed no significant difference between the 1 mol·L−1 KCl extraction kit method and indophenol blue colorimetry (p > 0.05). The linearity of the working curve was smooth, the linear detection range was 0.0−2.00 mg·L−1, the average relative standard deviation was 7.00% (n = 5), the standard addition recovery rate was 89.31−118.23%, and the detection limit were was 0.074 mg·L−1. We concluded that the 1 mol·L−1 KCl extraction kit method can be applied to determine the ammonia nitrogen content of paddy soil with different chemical properties. The 1 mol·L−1 KCl extraction kit method has the advantage over indophenol blue colorimetry due to its simple reagent preparation, convenient operation, and shorter detection time (the coloring and colorimetric time for 96 samples was only 30 min using the kit method coupled with a microplate reader). Hence, it has the potential for application due to its rapid determination of soil samples in large quantities.
Keywords: indophenol blue colorimetry; microplate reader; rapid detection kit; soil ammonia nitrogen.