More versatile, more skilled boxer. Much harder puncher for his weight class. The only thing Canelo has over him is chin (if you don't count pocket judges). Inoue is better all-around fighter than Canelo ever was, no questions about that
Canelo's a great fighter but his greatness is in large part because of his ambition and the fact he's been fighting for so long. He's built the best resume in boxing because he (usually) has the balls to fight top guys and because he started so young. But in terms of his actual ability as a fighter I wouldn't put him in the same class as Inoue, Crawford, Usyk, Bivol obviously and Beterbiev. That's not to say he's not a great talent, if he wasn't then he wouldn't have had the career hes had. But I think he's always been much more beatable than the other guys I mentioned.
It’s funny, there was an article here saying that Inoue doesn’t really consider Canelo a great fighter. When he lost to Bivol, he was like, “oh he lost?” in a very casual way.
Okay, well until an hour ago Inoue had never been down professionally. He was caught early by a limited fighter but nonetheless recognized as being at least a pretty big puncher. GGG also was no longer even close to a one punch KO artist by the start of the Canelo trilogy.
I love Inoue but I highly doubt Canelo would have been dropped by a similar hook to Nery’s. He also went 24 rounds eating bombs from a very dangerous GGG (not counting their trilogy fight which was essentially an exhibition) Chin is the one thing I would give Canelo. Inoue takes everything else
Part of that was because Canelo weight drained himself, which does reduce punch resistance. It is pretty rare for Canelo to be caught clean tho, just because of his slippery head movement and his ability to roll with punches, I think his chin is a smidge overrated tho.