The purpose of this article is to review the empirical research in green supply chain management (GSCM) and discuss its current status. The article provides an assessment of research methodologies of 216 empirical studies in GSCM, which are published during the period 2001–2019, according to the approach proposed by Flynn et al. (1990). The findings indicate that number of empirical papers in GSCM has increased at a faster rate over the last few years. However, there are several aspects of empirical research which have been still unexplored such as the use of actual data for analyzing the GSCM performance, use of longitudinal data and use of research designs other than survey. The sectors other than manufacturing and automotive are also still relatively unexplored. More focus is also needed on the collection of sample data from emerging economies. Finally, detailed frameworks need to be developed which can help firms to implement each of the GSCM practices. To the best of authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to specifically review the empirical papers in GSCM. The paper provides future research directions for empirical work in GSCM.