Before the use of phylogenetic analyses, Coeluridae and Coelurosauria were taxonomic wastebaskets used for small theropods that did not belong to other groups; thus, they accumulated many dubious genera.

[1][2] As late as the 1980s, popular books recognized over a dozen "coelurids", including such disparate forms as the noasaurid Laevisuchus and the oviraptorosaurian Microvenator, and considered them descendants of the coelophysids.

Rauhut, using a cladistic analysis, found Coeluridae to include Coelurus (Late Jurassic, North America), Compsognathus (Late Jurassic, Europe), Sinosauropteryx (Early Cretaceous, Asia) and an unnamed Compsognathus-like form (Early Cretaceous, South America; this dinosaur has since been placed in the new genus Mirischia).

Rauhut considered coelurids to be a monophyletic group of basal coelurosaurs, characterized by evolutionary reversals in some aspects of the vertebrae to the more primitive theropod condition.

The results of his phylogenetic analysis are displayed in the cladogram below:[12] Vayuraptor Shishugounykus Phuwiangvenator Coelurus Migmanychion Fukuivenator Ornitholestes Maniraptoriformes