A large, closely packed, steered array is modeled by imposing a traveling wave along the surface of a rectangular radiator. The results in this paper are most pertinent to closely packed arrays made up of elements that are small as compared with a wavelength. For this type of array, it is shown that at large steering angles the cavitation‐limited power is greatly reduced below that achievable at broadside. The cavitation factor is generally less when the beam is steered along the longer side of an array than when the beam is steered across its shorter side. Integral solutions for the nearfield pressure and radiation resistance of a general steered array are presented. Numerical results show that the radiation resistance has a maximum value at a particular steering angle for a specific array, and the nearfield pressures pile up near the leading edge of the array as the beam is steered to a large angle. In the end‐fire case, approximate expressions for the radiation resistance and the nearfield pressure are derived for an infinitely long rectangular strip with beam steering across the width, and for a finite, slender, rectangular array with beam steering along the longer side.