Empirical relationships between the surface radiative fluxes and satellite-measured radiances derived for the Tropical Ocean and Global Atmosphere, Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere Response Experiment (TOGA COARE) radiation sites are applied to compute the shortwave (solar) and longwave (thermal infrared) fluxes over the Pacific warm pool (narrowly defined as the region 10 ¿S--10 ¿N and 135 ¿E--175 ¿E). Even averaged over the entire COARE Intensive Observation Period, November 1992 to February 1993, the net surface radiative heating has a large spatial variation. Regions of minimum shortwave heating, which implies large clouds and strong convection, do not necessarily coincide with regions of maximum sea surface temperature. This indicates that the large-scale atmospheric dynamics, land-sea distribution, and sea surface temperature all play an important role in forcing convection in the warm pool. The total radiative heating (shortwave heating minus longwave cooling) ranges from 125 to 175 W m-2. The large spatial variation of surface radiative heating in the warm pool, averaged over a period of 4 months, could have a significant impact on the sea surface temperature and oceanic and atmospheric circulations. Partitioning of the shortwave heating between the surface and the atmosphere has been estimated. For the entire warm pool during the COARE Intensive Observation Period, the mean insolation at the top of the atmosphere is 420 W m-2, and the planetary albedo is ~30%. Two thirds (199 W m-2) of the total heating of the Earth-atmosphere system (294 W m-2) is absorbed at the surface, and one third (95 W m-2) is absorbed in the atmosphere. The effect of clouds on the shortwave heating of the atmospheric column is only +9 W m-2, which is not much different from radiation model calculations. The Earth Radiation Budget Experiment fluxes at the top of the atmosphere in the Pacific warm pool for the period November 1986 to February 1987 are used as a proxy for the shortwave heating of the Earth-atmosphere system. ¿ 1998 American Geophysical Union