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Fourfold increase in the number of accounts opened by women borrowing for business purposes in the last six years
Bengaluru, March 3, 2025: More women in India are seeking credit, and more women are also actively monitoring their credit scores and report1. These are some of the key findings of the annual report on women and retail credit2, “From Borrowers to Builders: Women’s Role in India’s Financial Growth Story”, published by TransUnion CIBIL , Women Entrepreneurship Platform’s (WEP) of Niti Aayog and MicroSave Consulting (MSC).
According to the report, 27 million women borrowers in India were actively monitoring their credit in December 2024, which is 42% higher than the approximately 19 million women who were doing so in December 2023. This indicates that women borrowers are increasingly recognizing the importance of credit health as a cornerstone of financial empowerment.
Younger Women Leading the Way in Credit Monitoring
As more women enter the workforce or become entrepreneurs, access to formal credit offers them a pathway to further their careers or support their business growth trajectory. Additionally, monitoring their credit helps women borrowers maintain their financial health, secure better loan terms, and protect against identity theft.
Announcing the launch of the report, Anna Roy, Principal Economic Advisor, NITI Aayog and Mission Director WEP, said: “Encouraging women entrepreneurship is one way of ensuring employment opportunities for women entering the workforce in India. It can also work as a viable strategy for accelerating equitable economic growth of our economy. Promoting women’s entrepreneurship could create employment opportunities for 150 to 170 million people while driving women’s participation in the labor force.”
B. V. R. Subrahmanyam, CEO of NITI Aayog, highlighted the critical role of access to finance in empowering women entrepreneurs, stating, “Government recognizes that access to finance is a fundamental enabler for women’s entrepreneurship. The Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) continues to work towards building an inclusive ecosystem that fosters financial literacy, access to credit, mentorship, and market linkages. However, ensuring equitable financial access requires a collective effort. The role of financial institutions in designing inclusive products tailored to women’s needs, along with policy initiatives that address structural barriers, will be instrumental in accelerating this momentum. To achieve this goal under the aegis of WEP, Financing Women Collaborative (FWC) has been constituted. We seek more financial sector stakeholders to join FWC and contribute to this mission.”
Drawing attention to the growing awareness about credit health among women entrepreneurs, Mr. Bhavesh Jain, MD & CEO, TransUnion CIBIL said: “The number of women self-monitoring their credit information report and score grew by 42%, from 18.94 million in December 2023 to 26.92 million in December 2024. While this is an encouraging trend, this must continue for women to progress from being participants to leaders in India’s economic story. Borrowers can make better informed financial decisions by being vigilant about their credit status.”
The report also highlights that the share of women in the total self-monitoring base increased to 19.43% in December 2024, up from 17.89% in December 2023.
Speaking on the report’s findings, Manoj Kumar Sharma, Managing Director, MSC said: “The findings are striking. The number of women seeking credit has grown at a CAGR of 22% since 2019, with 60% of borrowers coming from semi-urban and rural areas. This underscores a deepening financial footprint beyond metro cities.”
Additionally, younger Gen Z women are leading the way in credit monitoring, with the number in this cohort increasing by 56% year-over-year (YoY) leading to their share in the self-monitoring women population as 22% in 2024. The number of Millennial3 women witnessed a 38% YoY increase leading to a share of 52% among self-monitoring women population for the same period.
Even within the total self-monitoring population, the share of Gen Z women borrowers increased to 27.1% in December 2024, up from 24.9% in December 2023. Growth across these metrics indicates a higher level of financial awareness and a wider acceptance of credit management tools in the journey towards achieving financial independence.
Age Distribution of Self-Monitoring Women Consumers by 2024
Changing Preference in Loans Availed by Women Borrowers
The number of women availing credit in India has increased at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22% between CY 2019 and 2024. While consumption loans4 continue to be the preferred products held by women borrowers, the report’s insights show that more women are also availing business loans.
In 2024, the number of new loan accounts opened by women for business purposes (business loans, commercial vehicle and commercial equipment loans, loans against property) saw a growth of approximately 37 lakh, with disbursement totaling Rs 1.9 lakh crore, compared to approximately 8 lakh new loan accounts for business purposes and total disbursement of Rs 0.7 lakh crore in 2019. While the number of loan accounts has increased by over four times since 2019, these loans constituted only 3% of overall loans availed by women borrowers in 2024.
Consumption loans remain the most preferred credit product among women borrowers. The share of women borrowers with active consumption loans in their wallet grew to 36% by December 2024, from 33% in December 2019. Agri and gold loans combined were held by 34% of women borrowers by December 2024 compared to 32% in December 2019. Business loans witnessed the highest share shift, with 16% of women borrowers by December 2024 holding a live business purpose loan, compared to 9% in December 2019.
Being Credit-Aware Encourages Borrowers to Avail More Loans
TransUnion CIBIL data shows that 13.49% of women who actively monitor their credit information open a loan account within one month of their monitoring activity. This underscores how credit information awareness and monitoring directly translates into credit action.
Additionally, 44% of the women borrowers who actively monitor their credit information saw improvement in their credit scores within six months, reflecting the positive effect of increased financial awareness. Among women in the 90+ days past due (DPD) payment category at the time of their credit check, 17.45% moved to a lower delinquency bracket within six months, while 11.37% became standard borrowers. This indicates that in addition to aiding higher loan uptake, self-monitoring also drives improvements in credit health.
“By diligently making their loan repayments and benefiting from improved credit scores as a result of this behavior, women are increasingly availing multiple loans to address their diverse needs. Lenders can leverage this payments data to identify and target credit-ready and creditworthy women borrowers, while also seizing the opportunity to provide support to those who may require assistance with repayment, thereby laying the foundation for long-term, trust-based relationships with their borrowers,’’ said Bhushan Padkil Senior Vice President and Head of Direct-To-Consumer Business at TransUnion CIBIL.
State-Wide Distribution of Self-Monitoring Women Borrowers
Insights from the report indicate that more women borrowers from non-metro regions are active in self-monitoring their credit, compared to women borrowers from metro areas. The number of self-monitoring women from metro areas has grown by 30% YoY, while those in non-metro areas has grown by 48% during the same period.
In CY 2024, the top five states for self-monitoring women were Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh and Telangana. These states were home to 49% of all self-monitoring women across all states. The southern region had the highest number of self-monitoring women, with 10.2 million women. This region also experienced a growth of 46% in self-monitoring women from December 2023 to December 2024.
Northern and central states like Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh have witnessed a high compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) in active women borrowers over the last five years.
Need for More Women Centric and Inclusive Financial Offerings
Since 2019, women’s share in business loans origination increased by 14% and of gold loans by 6%. As of December 2024, women accounted for 35% of business borrowers in India. Despite these encouraging signs of improving credit awareness and credit health, women borrowers continue to face challenges to accessing credit such as credit aversion, poor banking experiences, barriers to credit readiness and constraints around collateral and guarantors.
With the constant rise of credit awareness and improved scores there is potential for financial institutions to increase lending to women with gender intelligent financial products that align to women’s unique business and personal needs.
Highlighting the issues faced by women borrowers, Mr. Jain said: “Addressing these challenges requires a multifaceted approach, including improving financial literacy, enhancing banking experiences, and creating more inclusive financial products and services. By doing so, we can ensure that women borrowers have equitable access to credit and the opportunity to achieve their financial goals.”
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1. Self-monitoring consumers are consumers who check their own CIBIL score and report.
2. Retail credit are loans and credit products to individuals as reported by credit institutions on consumer bureau of TransUnion CIBIL.
3. Gen Z consumers are born between 1995 and 2010, Millennial consumers are born between 1980 and 1994.
4. Consumption loans are credit cards, personal loans and consumer durable loans
