Its name is derived from the Ancient Greek κάμηλος (cámēlos, "camel")[1] and ὄψ (óps, "face"),[2] i.e. "camel-face".

Camelops lived across western North America, ranging from the Pacific Coast to the Great Plains, southwards to Honduras and northwards to Alaska.

Later authors have judged that while the jawbone undoubtedly represents Camelops, it is too fragmentary to be diagnostic to species, making C. kansanus a nomen dubium.

Later in 1874, Leidy named the species Camelops hesternus, based on teeth found in a gravel deposit in Arroyo Las Positas in Livermore Valley, Alameda County in the southern Bay Area of California.

[4][5] The family Camelidae, which contains the living camels as well as lamines (the tribe Lamini, which includes the llama, guanaco, alpaca and vicuña), first emerged in North America during the Eocene, around 46-42 million years ago, reaching its apex of diversity during the Miocene epoch (23-5.3 million years ago).

The two modern tribes of Camelidae, Camelini and Lamini, are suggested to have diverged during this period, around 17.5-16 million years ago.

[6] Living camels are thought to descend from Paracamelus, which crossed the Bering Land Bridge into Eurasia from North America during the Late Miocene, around 6 million years ago.

[3] During the Pleistocene, Camelops is known from fossils across western North America, ranging from California, Oregon and Washington State, eastwards to South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas, with rarer records further east, including near the Missouri-Illinois border.

[15] As in living camels, Camelops may have had a slow reproductive rate, including giving birth to a single offspring at a time, as well as existing at relatively low population densities due to its large size.

At Wally's Beach in Alberta, Canada, butchered remains of Camelops hesternus displaying cut and fracture marks, alongside those of caballine true horses are associated with stone tools, with the site radiocarbon dated to around 13,300 years ago.

[29] A sacrum of Camelops found near Tequixquiac in central Mexico has been suggested to have been shaped to resemble an animal head.