There are many well-known examples of tradeoffs between certain traits in plants, where being specialized in certain conditions comes at the cost of being poorly specialized in others. Given that climate change is increasing the occurrence of record-breaking heatwaves around the world, it is important to identify any such tradeoffs that influence the ability of plants to endure extreme heat. Two key adaptations that allow plants to mitigate heat stress to their leaves are (1) being able to tolerate and function at high temperatures; and (2) avoiding heat via evaporative cooling. We tracked eight different species during a three-day heatwave to test whether there was a tradeoff between leaf cooling and heat tolerance. The species varied widely in how much they cooled their leaves, as well as how much heat they could tolerate. Ultimately, we found that the plants that cooled their leaves the most during the heatwave also tended to have the lowest heat tolerance levels, which is evidence of a tradeoff between these two responses to heat. This finding suggests that plants that can cool their leaves during heatwaves may not need to invest their resources in increasing their heat tolerance.