Titanium nitride is a compound having a high melting point of 2950.degree. C., a hardness of 8-9 in Moh's scale, exhibits good electrical conductance and is stable at high temperatures in inert atmospheres. It is known that sodium cyanide reacts at high temperatures with oxides such as BPO.sub.4, SiO.sub.2 and TiO.sub.2 to yield, respectively, BN, Si C and TiN and sodium salts of oxyanions. However, in the process of forming TiN from TiO.sub.2, salts such as Na.sub.2 Ti.sub.6 O.sub.13 and Na.sub.8 Ti.sub.5 O.sub.14 are also formed which are difficult to separate from TiN, the product of interest. Therefore there is a need to develope a process for making TiN that does not produce byproducts that interfere with obtaining the final product.