The season will constitute of 24 clubs as nominated by the Member State Associations. The Group stage will consist of the clubs which will be divided into six groups of four each. Each club will play their opponents in their respective group once in a round-robin format, with the winners of every group proceeding to the Final Round. The Group Stages will be played across multiple venues. The Final Round will constitute of a single-leg round-robin format, with the top two teams gaining promotion to the Indian Women's League. The Final Round matches will be held at a centralised venue.[4]
With the withdrawals of 9 clubs, the Group stage was left with 15 clubs and were split into three groups of five each. Each club will play their opponents in their respective group once in a round-robin format, with the top two teams of every group proceeding to the Final Round. The Final Round will constitute of a single-leg round-robin format, with the top two teams gaining promotion to the Indian Women's League.[5]
In February 2024, AIFF announced the eligibility for nomination of clubs in the IWL 2, with the Member Associations required to conduct a league with at least six teams with a minimum of 10 matches per team.[7] The League Committee reviewed the nominations filed by the various State FAs and recommended the finalisation of the teams after cut-off date.[8]
The list of the participants for IWL 2, finalised after 5 February 2024, which is the last date of nomination for the IWL 2 teams with the draw held on 4 March 2024.[9] 9 teams withdrew citing financial demands of AIFF such as registration fee and high club overhead costs and inability to assemble sufficient number of players with the second division running parallelly with IWL.[10] The 6 teams qualifying from last year's IWL withdrew along with this years' qualifying teams from the states, Manipur Police, Kerala United and Parikrma FC. The remaining teams were joined by additional teams nominated by the states to form the 15 teams for the season.
