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Inland waters are any area of water, such as canals, tidal and non-tidal rivers, lakes, and some estuarial waters, not categorised as 'sea'.

Inland means far away from the ocean, or in the very middle of a country. If you were born and grew up in Kansas, you're familiar with inland living. The opposite of inland is coastal.

Infrastructure on inland waterways is comprised of locks and dams as well as navigation channels. Attempts are made to dredge channels to ensure a minimum depth and width needed to support commercial barge traffic.

Inland navigation, inland barge transport or inland waterway transport (IWT) is a transport system allowing ships and barges to use inland waterways (such as canals, rivers and lakes). These waterways have inland ports, marinas, quays, and wharfs.

Inland waterways consist of rivers, lakes, canals and backwaters. Rivers and lakes are natural waterways, whereas canals and backwaters are artificial. The inland waterways are used for transporting heavy loads through the water. The transportation system on the water is commonly referred to as marine transport.

The Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) is a network of navigable channels, rivers, bays, and canals that stretches more than 3,000 miles along the eastern and Gulf coasts of the United States, from Boston, Massachusetts to Brownsville, Texas.

Some of the important inland waterways in India are the Ganga and Brahmaputra river system, the backwaters of Kerala and Godavari and Krishna rivers.

The difference is that while inland is majorly used for shipping within the country, ocean shipping connects key global trade centers. Ocean transport is more popular today than inland and includes container shipping and ocean towing.