The Little River is a tributary of Rakaia River, about 7 km (4.3 mi) long, in the Canterbury Plains of New Zealand's South Island. It rises on the 2,185 m (7,169 ft) Mount Hutt and enters the Rakaia 314 m (1,030 ft) above sea level.^[1]

Little River is also the name of a short river, roughly 2 km (1.2 mi), on Stewart Island,^[2] about a 2-hour walk from Oban.^[3]

Wairewa marae, a marae (tribal meeting ground) of Ngāi Tahu and its Wairewa Rūnanga branch, is located at Little River.^[4] It includes Te Mako wharenui (meeting house).^[5]

MainPower’s Cleardale power station, was built in 2010. It takes up to 450 L (99 imp gal; 120 US gal)/second^[6] through a fibreglass penstock,^[7] 2.3 km (1.4 mi) up from,^[6] and 300 m (980 ft) above,^[8] the station, to drive a 1 mW (1.3×10⁻⁶ hp) pelton wheel.^[6] Power is generated at 400 volts and transformed to feed into Electricity Ashburton's 11 kV network.^[8] Some water from the tailrace is used to irrigate 208 ha (510 acres),^[9] with the remainder returned to the river.^[6] The power station and penstock have been landscaped^[10] and are now barely visible.^[11]