Kinosternoidea was named by Hay (1892). It is extant. It was considered monophyletic by Joyce (2007), Danilov and Parham (2008).

It was reranked as the superfamily Kinosternidae by Baur (1893), Carroll (1988), Shoshani et al. (1989), de Broin and de la Fuente (1993), Weems and George (2001), Cadena et al. (2012), Bourque (2013), Hutchison et al. (2013), Brinkman et al. (2016), Cadena et al. (2017); it was reranked as the family Cinosternidae by Jaekel (1911), Perrier (1928); it was reranked as the unranked clade Kinosternoidea by Joyce et al. (2004), Joyce (2007), Danilov and Parham (2008), Knauss et al. (2011), Sullivan et al. (2012), Bourque et al. (2015), Joyce and Bourque (2016); it was misspelled as Cinosternidae by Gadow (1898), Kuhn (1946), van Dijk et al. (2014); it was reranked as the family Kinosternoidea by Carrano (2025).

It was assigned to Chelydroidea by Baur (1893); to Cryptodiri by Jaekel (1911), Perrier (1928); to Testudines by Shoshani et al. (1989); to Durocryptodira by Danilov and Parham (2008); to Chelydroidea by Knauss et al. (2011); to Cryptodira by Cadena et al. (2012); to Eucryptodira by Sullivan et al. (2012), Hutchison et al. (2013); to Trionychoidea by Carroll (1988), de Broin and de la Fuente (1993), Joyce et al. (2004), Joyce (2007), Bourque et al. (2015); to Pankinosternoidea by Joyce and Bourque (2016); to Cryptodira by Cope (1871), Cope (1875), Gadow (1898), Kuhn (1946), Weems and George (2001), Bourque (2013), van Dijk et al. (2014), Brinkman et al. (2016), Cadena et al. (2017); and to Trionychoidea by Carrano (2025).