Indirect coal liquefaction has enormous potential applications. Increasingly, new synthetic technologies have been concentrating in this area, and a number of new large-scale indirect coal liquefaction plants have been set up during very recent years. Further, a large volume of papers on indirect coal liquefaction have been published over the last two decades, including those on Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, syngas to ethylene glycol, syngas to methanol, dimethyl ether as well as methanol to olefins. In this review, the recent literature of indirect liquefaction, including Fischer-Tropsch and syngas to chemicals, are summarized, with an emphasis on the reaction mechanisms, conditions and novel catalysts. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.