Miocene subtidal sandwave deposits in southwest Japan were influenced by periodic flow and steady flow. The sandwave deposits can be divided into five units, based on lithofacies and thickness. In order of accretion, unit 1 consists of unidirectional sand bedforms without mud drapes, unit 2 of unidirectional sand bedforms with thin, discontinuous mud drapes, unit 3 of bidirectional sand bedforms with thin continuous mud drapes, and units 4 and 5 of relatively thinner and smaller bidirectional sand bedforms with continuous mud drapes. The thickness of units 1 to 3 increase progressively to 2.6 m, and units 4 to 5 subsequently decrease from 2.0 to 1.0 m. Variations between the units are due to differing combinations of periodic and steady flow velocities. Palaeoflow velocity is estimated from grain size and unit thickness. Depth-mean velocities of steady flow components gradually decrease from 0.72 ms−1 to 0.16 ms−1 with unit accumulation.