We apply surface-enhanced infrared absorption (SEIRA) spectroscopy to host-guest complexes in liquid phase to examine the structural change in the complex formation. Two thiol derivatives of 18-crown-6 (18C6) are chemisorbed on a gold surface, and aqueous solutions of MCl salts (M = Li, Na, K, Rb, and Cs) are put to form M+.18C6 complexes. Infrared spectra of these complexes in the 900-2000 cm(-1) region are obtained by SEIRA spectroscopy. The observed IR spectra show noticeable peaks due to the complex formation, demonstrating that SEIRA spectroscopy will be a powerful method to investigate the structure of host-guest complexes in supramolecular chemistry. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.