In the first piece in NLSIR's Special Blog Series entitled Beyond the Gig, Ambika Tandon and Aayush Rathi argue that while the platform economy is often portrayed as expanding opportunities, especially for women in the global South, it largely reproduces existing labour market inequalities and introduces new forms of precarity, surveillance, and discrimination. The article highlights three key policy areas that must be addressed with a gender-responsive lens: the digital gender gap that limits women’s access to platform work, the need to extend anti-discrimination and equal pay protections to gig workers, and the redesign of social protection systems that currently depend on formal employment. The authors contend that many existing policy frameworks can be adapted to gig work, but meaningful reform requires recognising structural gender inequalities and involving workers themselves in shaping regulation and governance.