The aim of this paper was to develop and characterize chitosan nanoparticle as a carrier for adriamycin delivery as chitosan nanoparticles are the potential delivery system for hydrophilic drugs due to its outstanding physicochemical and biological properties. Chitosan nanoparticles have gained more attention as drug delivery carriers because of their better stability, low toxicity, simple and mild preparation method, and providing versatile routes of administration. Chitosan nanoparticles containing the anticancer drug adriamycin was prepared by the ionic gelation technique and characterized by various techniques such as particle size analysis, FT-IR and Atomic Force Microscopy. Results showed that chitosan nanoparticles prepared are of uniform size with an average diameter of 90 nm and zeta potential 62.5mV with a high encapsulation efficiency of 91.9%. Adriamycin loading efficiencies were determined and release studies were performed in PBS at room temperature. The drug release rate of Adriamycin from the chitosan nanoparticles was approximately 60% showing the potential of chitosan nanoparticles as a sustained drug delivery system. Cytotoxicity tests showed that the Adriamycin-loaded chitosan had higher cell toxicity by delivering the drug to the tumour tissues than adriamycin alone.