The correlation between the clearness index and sunshine duration is useful in the estimation of the solar radiation for areas where measured solar radiation data are unavailable. Regression techniques and artificial neural networks were used to investigate the correlations between daily global solar radiation (GSR) and sunshine duration for different climates in China. Measurements made during the 30-year period (1971-2000) from 41 measuring stations covering 9 thermal and 7 solar climate zones and sub-zones across China were gathered and analysed. The performance of the regression and the ANN models in the thermal and solar zones was analysed and compared. The coefficient of determination (R-2), Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency coefficient (NSEC), mean bias error (MBE) and rootmean-square error (RMSE) were determined. It was found that the regression models in both the thermal and the solar climate zones showed a strong correlation between the clearness index and sunshine duration (R-2 = 0.79-88). There appeared to be an increasing trend of larger MBE and RMSE from colder climates in the north to warmer climates in the south. In terms of the thermal and solar climate zone models, there was very little to choose between the two models. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.