Summary Thermogravimetry (TG) was applied to evaluate the thermal behavior of five refinery atmospheric distillation residues (ATR) obtained from different Brazilian crude oils. The asphaltenes were extracted of each sample and their influence on coke formation was studied. It was observed that they have a great contribution on carbonaceous residues formation during pyrolysis and that the heavier the ATR sample, the higher is the contribution of other heavy components present in ATR samples.