The NHL waiver draft was an annual draft held by the National Hockey League (NHL) from 1977 to 2003. A reworked version of the NHL intra-league draft, the waiver draft was created to help address the league's competitive balances issues and the financial issues some of the expansion teams added in the preceding ten years were undergoing. It was not held during the 1979–80 and 1991–92 seasons due to the 1979 merger with the World Hockey Association and the 1991 NHL dispersal and expansion drafts, respectively. It was discontinued as a result of the collective bargaining agreement that was reached to end the 2004–05 NHL lockout. Over the course of 25 waiver drafts, 231 selections were made and 240 players total changed teams.

The NHL intra-league was an annual draft held by the National Hockey League (NHL) from 1952 to 1975. The intra-league draft was created to help address the league’s competitive balance issues during the Original Six era, as the Detroit Red Wings, Montreal Canadiens, and Toronto Maple Leafs were the only teams to win the Stanley Cup in the ten years preceding the draft’s inception. It had an inauspicious start as the first two drafts featured no players being selected, and after the third saw only one player selected, the fourth draft wasn’t even held due to unanimous agreement among the six NHL teams that none of the available players was worth drafting. Eventually more players started being selected in the intra-league draft and, with the exception of 1967 when the NHL expanded in size from six to twelve teams, it was held every year through 1975. It was not held in 1976 and was replaced by the NHL waiver draft in 1977.