Difference spectroscopy and enzyme kinetics were employed to study the interaction of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) from rabbit muscle with the azo-dye Procion Red HE-3B and two of its structural variants in order to follow the significance of the sulphonated terminal rings for the strength and specificity of binding. Procion Red HE-3B possesses a significantly higher affinity to LDH compared to the dye Cibacron Blue F3G-A, a well characterized pseudo-biospecific ligand of dehydrogenases. Moreover, Procion Red HE-3B showed competition towards the cofactor NAD+/NADH. The enzyme-dye complex is mainly stabilized by hydrophobic interactions, but other binding forces cannot be excluded. LDH possesses one dye-binding site per subunit. As a binding region the active center of LDH, preferentially the hydrophobic nicotinamide pocket is involved. Removal of the negatively charged sulphonic acid group from the terminal rings of Procion Red HE-3B decreases the affinity to LDH significantly but does not change the type of binding. Addition of an anilino group to the terminal rings of Procion Red HE-3B does not affect the affinity to the active site significantly but enables the binding on other sites with lower affinity in dependence on the dye concentration.