Species within the order were formerly referred to the "heterobasidiomycetes" or "jelly fungi", since many have gelatinous basidiocarps (fruit bodies) that produce spores on septate basidia.

In 1922, British mycologist Carleton Rea recognized the order as containing the families Auriculariaceae and Ecchynaceae, as well as the rusts (Coleosporiaceae and Pucciniaceae) and the smuts (Ustilaginaceae).

[3][4][5] Jülich (1981) also separated out the rusts and smuts, but recognized the remaining Auriculariales as an independent order, placing within them the families Auriculariaceae, Cystobasidiaceae, Paraphelariaceae, Saccoblastiaceae, Ecchynaceae, Hoehnelomycetaceae, and Patouillardinaceae.

[6] A radical revision was undertaken in 1984, when American mycologist Robert Joseph Bandoni used transmission electron microscopy to investigate the ultrastructure of the septal pore apparatus in the Auriculariales.

[9] Molecular research, based on cladistic analysis of DNA sequences, has substantially supported Bandoni's revised circumscription of the Auriculariales, but has moved the Sebacinaceae and the Tremellodendropsidaceae to their own separate orders, the Sebacinales and Tremellodendropsidales.