PurposeThis paper aims to organize the existing empirical research on women entrepreneurs (WEs) in India, highlight the research areas that have not received attention and present opportunities for future research.Design/methodology/approachA systematic literature review (SLR) was performed on 74 scholarly articles focusing on WEs in India and published between 1993 and 2020. This review is structured around the 4W framework used in previous SLRs. The review is directed by the following foci: what do we know about academic research on WEs in India? How were these studies conducted? Where were these studies conducted? Why should academicians and practitioners consider WE research?FindingsThe authors arrived at four main themes underlying the empirical research on WEs: success factors for WEs, challenges faced by WEs, factors that attract and motivate WEs and performance measures for WEs. While challenges and success factors have received attention from researchers, there is a distinct lack of papers on factors that attract or motivate WE and performance measures. The main gaps identified were a lack of theoretical basis in studies, reliance on interview and survey-based methodology and a lack of context-specific studies.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings of this review are limited to WEs operating in India. Only Scopus-indexed journals listed in the Australian Business Dean's Council Journal Quality List (ABDC JQL) were included in the final SLR list.Originality/valueThis is one of the first studies to use a systematic approach to provide a detailed account of the state of the literature on women's entrepreneurship research in India.