Sascha Kraus, Matthias Breier, Weng Marc Lim, Marina Dabic, Satish Kumar, Dominik K. Kanbach, Debmalya Mukherjee, Vincenzo Corvello, Juan Piñeiro-Chousa, Eric Liguori, Daniel Palacios Marqués, Francesco Schiavone, Alberto Ferraris, Cristina Fernandes, João J. Ferreira

• Review articles or literature reviews are a critical part of scientific research. While numerous guides on literature reviews exist, these are often limited to the philosophy of review procedures, protocols, and nomenclatures, triggering non-parsimonious reporting and confusion due to overlapping similarities. To address the aforementioned limitations, we adopt a pragmatic approach to demystify and shape the academic practice of conducting literature reviews. We concentrate on the types, focuses, considerations, methods, and contributions of literature reviews as independent, standalone studies. As such, our article serves as an overview that scholars can rely upon to navigate the fundamental elements of literature reviews as standalone and independent studies, without getting entangled in the complexities of review procedures, protocols, and nomenclatures.