The usual procedure for retrieving the optical thickness of liquid water clouds from satellite-measured radiances is based on the assumption of plane-parallel layers composed of liquid water droplets. This study investigates the validity of this assumption from Advanced Earth Orbiting Satellite-Polarization and Directionality of the Earth's Reflectances (ADEOS-POLDER) observations. To do that, the authors take advantage of the multidirectional viewing capability of the POLDER instrument, which functioned nominally aboard ADEOS from November 1996 to June 1997. The usual plane-parallel cloud model composed of water droplets with an effective radius of 10 μm provides a reasonable approximation of the angular dependence in scattering at visible wavelengths from overcast liquid water clouds for moderate solar zenith angles. However, significant differences between model and observations appear in the rainbow direction and for the smallest observable values of scattering angle (Θ < 90°). A better overall agreement would be obtained for droplets with an effective radius of about 7-8 μm for continental liquid water clouds. On the other hand, changing the water droplet size distribution would not lead to a significant improvement for maritime situations. When horizontal variations in cloud optical thickness are considered by using the independent pixel approximation (IPA), a small improvement is obtained over the whole range of scattering angles but significant discrepancies remain for Θ < 80°, that is for large solar zenith angles in the forward-scattering direction. The remaining differences between various models based on the plane-parallel radiative transfer and POLDER observations are thought to be due to variations in cloud shape.