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The main objective of this paper is the validation of CYCLOPES version 3.1 LAI and fAPAR products. It is achieved by the comparison with MODIS collection 4 and 4.1 products and ECOCLIMAP LAI climatology over the BELMANIP representative set of sites, and with ground measurements over a limited set of sites. Great attention is paid to the consistency of the comparison: for the spatial dimension, product PSF appears to be the main aspect governing the spatial resolution at which the comparison has to be achieved. For CYCLOPES, a minimal size of the sites should be 3 km×3 km², while the optimal one is 10 km×10 km²; regarding the temporal sampling interval and resolution, the problem is much easier to solve when assuming a relatively smooth time course of vegetation characteristics (8–16 days). Great care was also paid to the departure of products from the nominal definition, particularly for LAI where …