Alkali niobate ceramics, such as (Na0.5K0.5)NbO3, has been considered as a promising candidate for lead free piezoelectrics and been a subject of growing interest. We focused on the effects of low oxygen partial pressure (pO(2)) firing of alkali niobate ceramics, and found that piezoelectric and dielectric properties are essentially independent of the firing atmosphere. Furthermore, low pO(2) firing provides better electrical resistivity and microstructure than air firing, which can be explained by the fact that alkali volatilization is suppressed in low pO(2) firing condition. This opens new opportunities for base meal cofired multilayer applications in the alkali niobate perovskite system. We also found that low pO(2) fired NaNbO3 - NaTaO3 solid state ceramic exhibited a much higher resistivity than conventional ferroelectric ceramics such as BaTiO3, and also showed relatively high permittivity at high temperatures up to 250 degrees C, which make this ceramic promising as a capacitor material for the expanding high temperature.