In this paper, effects of inlet shape on the performance of a submerged cargo pump were numerically studied using a commercial CFD code ANSYS-CFX. The inlet shape, especially the gap between pump and suction well, is an important parameter in a point of view of performances of submerged cargo pump due to its effects on the residual and also hydraulic performance of the pump, respectively. To investigate the optimized gap, the overall performance degradations were calculated with the gap. In addition to that, the flow field through the gap was investigated to explain the effect of velocity non-uniformity on the performance of the pump impeller.