Wind stresses and surface heat fluxes over the Pacific Ocean from the National Center for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) reanalysis and the comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set (COADS) (blended with FSU tropical wind stresses) are compared over a common time interval (1958--1997) in their statistics and in the responses that they induce in sea surface temperature (SST) and heat storage when used to force an ocean model. Wind stress anomalies from the two data sets are well correlated in the midlatitude extratropics, especially in the highly sampled North Pacific. In the tropics and subtropics, low correlations were found between the two wind stress data sets. The amplitudes of the stress variations of the two data sets are similar in midlatitudes, but in the tropics NCEP wind stresses are weaker than the COADS/FSU stresses, especially on interannual timescales. Surface heat flux anomalies from the two data sets are well correlated on interannual and shorter timescales in the North Pacific Ocean poleward of 20 ¿N, but they are poorly correlated elsewhere and on decadal timescales. In the extratropics the amplitudes of the heat flux variations of the two data sets are comparable, but in the tropics the NCEP heat fluxes are weaker than those of COADS. Ocean model hindcasts driven by both data sets are also compared. The midlatitude SST hindcasts were superior when using the NCEP flux anomalies while tropical SST hindcasts were equally skillful for the two hindcasts when considering all climatic timescales. The spatial and temporal sampling rates of the COADS observations and their consequent impacts on constraining the NCEP reanalysis appear to be the main factors controlling the results found here. ¿ 2001 American Geophysical Union