The occurrence of climate induced shocks such as drought has increased its severity and affects the livelihood security of people indiscriminately. However, there are certain groups of people who are more vulnerable and less resilient to withstand shocks. The aim of this study is to examine gender differences in resilience to drought among male and female headed rural households in Lay Gayint district, Ethiopia. Primary data were collected from 422 sample household heads through questionnaire. The study employed the FAO’s econometric model to measure resilience and principal component analysis was employed to derive the resilience index. Chi-square test was used to assess the presence of statistically significant difference among different categories. P value less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant for all tests. Overall households that are non-resilient to drought in the study area were 227 (53.8%). In this study, we have found disproportion in resilience status among male headed and female headed households. Female headed households have disproportionally high non-resilient level 40 (69%) to drought compared to male headed counter parts 187(51.4%). Hence, the result revealed that resilience to drought between male and female headed households was statistically significant (p= 0.016) in which, female headed households are less resilient than male headed households in the study area. Any intervention aiming at resilience building of households in the study area should prioritize and address the vulnerability of women.