<p>Light-absorbing particles (LAPs) deposited on snow can decrease snow albedo and affect climate through the snow-albedo radiative forcing. In this study, we use MODIS observations combined with a snow albedo model (SNICAR) and a radiative transfer model (SBDART) to retrieve the radiative forcing by LAPs in snow (RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub>) across Northeastern China (NEC) in January–February from 2003 to 2017. RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub> presents distinct spatial variability, with the minimum (22.3 W m<sup>−2</sup>) in western NEC and the maximum (64.6 W m<sup>−2</sup>) near industrial areas in central NEC. The regional mean RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub> is ~ 45.1 ± 6.8 W m<sup>−2</sup> in NEC. The positive (negative) uncertainties of retrieved RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub> due to atmospheric correction range from 14 % to 57 % (−14 % to −47 %) and the uncertainty value basically decreased with the increased RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub>. We attribute the variations of radiative forcing based on remote sensing and find that the spatial variance of RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub> in NEC is 74.6 % due to LAPs, while 21.2 % and 4.2 % due to snow grain size, and solar zenith angle. Furthermore, based on multiple linear regression, the BC dry and wet deposition and snowfall could totally explain 81 % of the spatial variance of LAP contents, which confirms the reasonability of the spatial patterns of retrieved RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub> in NEC. We validate RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub> using in situ radiative forcing estimates. We find that the biases in RF<sup>Laps</sup><sub>MODIS</sub> are negatively correlated with LAP concentrations and range from ~ 5 % to ~ 350 % in NEC.</p>