Innovation can be considered a factor that drives economic growth at the territorial level, which is why there has been a search for operationalizing the concept of innovation through the measurement of innovative performance in systems. Recent studies have focused on summarizing the current measurement instruments applied in countries or industries, focusing on briefly presenting their themes and characteristics. In this sense, the aim of this work is to present a literature review on the measurement of innovative performance, exploring and classifying the antecedents, methodologies, application contexts, possible impact on the technological gap, and commonly measured dimensions that define innovation in terms of measurement. The results allow us to observe the relevance of the mentioned topic, and consequently, the opportunity to expand existing knowledge in future research.