[1] This order first appeared about 55.8 million years ago in the Eocene Era, and is composed primarily of omnivores.

[2][3] Many centrarchiforms look essentially perch-like, featuring a stocky build and a spine-bearing dorsal fin, and range in size from 2.5 cm in length (for Elassoma gilberti), to 1.8 meters for the Maccullochella peelii.

[6] The earliest fossils of this group are of Percichthys from the Early Paleocene of Bolivia, although this status is tentative.

[7] If these remains are not of a percichthyid, then the earliest known centrarchiform fossils are of oplegnathids from the Early Eocene of Antarctica.

[8] Centrarchiformes includes the following subgroups:[9] Cladogram from Near & Thacker, 2024:[10] Percalates (estuary perches) Girellidae (nibblers) Scorpididae (halfmoons) Kyphosidae (sea chubs) Kuhlia (flagtails) Terapontidae (grunters) Dichistius (galjoen fishes) Oplegnathus (knifejaws) Caesioscorpis theagenes (blowhole perch) Microcanthidae (stripeys) Centrarchidae (sunfishes and blackbasses) Sinipercidae (oriental perches) Enoplosus armatus (old wife) Parascorpis typus (jutjaw) Percichthyidae (temperate perches) Cirrhitidae (hawkfishes) Latridae (trumpeters and morwongs) Chironemus (kelpfishes) Aplodactylus (marblefishes) Cheilodactylus (fingerfishes)