Albertosaurus was named by Osborn (1905). It was considered monophyletic by Currie (2000).

It was synonymized subjectively with Aublysodon by Romer (1956), Parsch (1963); it was synonymized subjectively with Deinodon by Tatarinov (1964).

It was assigned to Theropoda by Osborn (1905); to Megalosauridae by Huene (1909); to Coeluridae by von Zittel (1911); to Aublysodontinae by Nopcsa (1928); to Deinodontinae by Matthew and Brown (1922), Hay (1930); to Theropoda by Parks (1935); to Carnosauria by Kuhn (1939); to Deinodontidae by Brown (1914), Russell (1930), Stromer (1934), Gilmore (1946); to Dinodontidae by Huene (1926), Huene (1927), Colbert (1964); to Coelurosauria by Pérez-Moreno et al. (1994); to Tyrannosaurinae by Paul (1988), Holtz (1997), Currie (2000), Holtz (2001); to Tyrannosauridae by Walker (1964), Romer (1966), Russell and Chamney (1967), Steel (1970), Russell (1970), Coulton (1976), Kurzanov (1976), Lawson (1976), Molnar (1978), Baird and Horner (1979), Molnar (1980), Molnar (1980), Lehman (1981), Barsbold (1983), Dodson (1983), Thulborn (1984), Russell (1984), Breithaupt (1985), Clemens (1986), Gauthier (1986), Carroll (1988), Mader and Bradley (1989), Kurzanov (1989), Molnar et al. (1990), Molnar (1991), Currie (1992), Carpenter (1992), Buffetaut et al. (1996), Carpenter (1997), Padian (1997), Hernández-Rivera (1997), Ryan (1997), Ryan (1997), Eberth (1997), Sereno (1998), Carr (1999), Currie (2000), Currie et al. (2003), Rauhut (2003), Erickson et al. (2004), Carr et al. (2005), Urban and Lamanna (2006), Li et al. (2009), Carr et al. (2011), Brown and Druckenmiller (2011), Paulina Carabajal and Currie (2012), Dalman (2013), Lü et al. (2014), Carr et al. (2017); and to Albertosaurinae by Currie (2003), Currie et al. (2003), Holtz (2004), Rivera-Sylva and Longrich (2024).