Reinforced concrete (RC) two-way slabs without shear reinforcement are commonly used in many structural systems. This paper investigated the structural behaviour of RC slabs subjected to concentrated loads leading to punching shear failure using shell and continuum nonlinear finite element analysis (NLFEA). Shear force distributions are studied for four types of slabs with different geometry of support, geometry of slab and layout of reinforcement. All factors investigated have been proven to influence the shear force distributions along the control perimeter around the support. Significant shear force redistributions due to cracking and reinforcement yielding have been observed using NLFEA. Reduced control perimeters to be used for simplified approaches accounting for calculated shear force distributions are calculated using both NLFE approaches.