Paul Holmes (born 1951) is a radio and television broadcaster in New Zealand. He is widely reputed to be New Zealand's highest-paid broadcasting personality (reportedly over NZ$700,000 while at Television New Zealand). He has a morning radio talkback show and now hosts a new show from Australian-owned broadcaster Prime Television.

Holmes began his career on radio in Christchurch in the 1970s before working in Australia, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. Afterwards, he returned to New Zealand to take up a morning slot on Wellington station 2ZB.

In March 1987, Holmes took over from long-running 1ZB host Merv Smith. At the time, 1ZB had fallen to seventh position, but with Holmes's show, the station rose to number one for the programme's time slot.

In 1989, Holmes was part of the younger, new-look revamp of Television New Zealand's prime-time news. His 7 p.m. network programme (simply titled Holmes), analysing news items in greater depth, ran until 2004.

Holmes's first TV segment featured guest Dennis Conner, the America’s Cup skipper. After being provoked, Conner walked off the show, providing Holmes headlines the next day.

He has on several occasions gained media prominence for a range of scurrilous remarks on individuals, politicians and diplomats who have media attention, including a remark made in 2003 about wahi tapu .

In September 2003, Holmes infamously described United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan as a "cheeky darkie" during a rant on his radio show.

There was an international outcry following the comments, but Holmes kept his job after making several emotional apologies, claiming he had been "tired". However the major sponsor of his TV show, Mitsubishi Motors Corporation, withdrew its support.

In March the following year, he described the Israeli Prime Minister as the "butcher Sharon." A couple of weeks after Easter that year, he called Tariana Turia a "confused bag of lard", a bully who folded under pressure and who did not have the “guts to vote”, and as being “all mouth and no trousers, all talk and no walk”. As well, he described her as a “complete fool”.

On 2 November, 2004, he resigned from his TV show after failed contract negotiations. It was reported by TV3 that TVNZ would not renew his contract for more than a year. He has moved to a rival TV company, Prime Television, which had offered a three-year contract. His salary is rumoured to be in excess of NZ$800,000.

The new show, Paul Holmes, on Prime was launched on 7 February, 2005. ANZ Bank is a sponsor of the new series, running at prime time at 7 p.m., opposite his old programme, retitled Close-Up, an old title from the TVNZ archives.

In February 2005, Holmes's new show was rating 7.1 per cent for its timeslot. His former programme on TV One was pulling in a 31 per cent share. The following month, with the launch of a rival show on TV3, Nielsen Media Ratings put Holmes's show at 4 per cent.

His autobiography was published in 1999. He has released one music album and another is expected soon.

Paul Holmes has survived multiple aircraft crashes, the latest on 31 December, 2004.