The photosensitizer ability of phenalenone was studied in aqueous and lipid media through the single electron transfer reactions, employing the density functional theory. Although phenalenone is a well-known photosensitizer and is widely used as an O-1(2) reference sensitizer, little is known about the reaction mechanism involved. In this study we carried out a single electron transfer reaction between the basal, excited, oxidized and reduced state of phenalenone with oxygen molecules such as O-3(2) and O-2(center dot-). In aqueous media the photosensitizer capacity of phenalenone was measured through both type I and type II mechanisms. In lipid media the photosensitizer ability of phenalenone was attributed to the type II mechanism. The results indicated that the photosensitizer ability of phenalenone shows a heavy reliance on the media where the reaction occurs whether this is an aqueous or lipid media. Finally, this study supports the idea about that electron transfer reactions can be used to study the photosensitizer ability of molecules.