Only one species is currently recognized, E. mefi; the specific name honours the MEF, the Museo Paleontológico "Egidio Feruglio", where discoverer Diego Pol is active.

The remains were found in the Jugo Loco locality that is placed in a series of fine beds of mudstone, marlstone, and limestone in the Cañadón Asfalto Formation.

In 2012, based on these remains, the type species Eoabelisaurus mefi was named and described by Pol and his German colleague Oliver Rauhut.

[2] Before discovery, the oldest known abelisaurids were represented only by fragmentary remains from the late Early Cretaceous of South America and Africa and older records of abelisauroids in general were questionable.

The length of vertebral centra remains constant over the preserved portion of the tail, but middle and posterior caudals are considerably lower.

Spinostropheus Elaphrosaurus Limusaurus Deltadromeus Laevisuchus Noasaurus Velocisaurus Masiakasaurus Berberosaurus Eoabelisaurus Genyodectes Ceratosaurus Chenanisaurus Rugops Abelisaurus Ilokelesia Arcovenator Indosaurus Majungasaurus Rajasaurus Dahalokely Rahiolisaurus Ekrixinatosaurus Skorpiovenator Viavenator Pycnonemosaurus Quilmesaurus Carnotaurus Aucasaurus Subsequent analyses placed Eoabelisaurus as a basal abelisaurid,[8][9] a sister taxon of the abelisauroid,[10] or an abelisauroid outside the abelisaurid family.

[11] Before the discovery of Eoabelisaurus, abelisaurid anatomy was only known from a handful of Late Cretaceous taxa that were aberrant in their morphology, such as their unusual skull structure and reduction of their forelimbs.

Eoabelisaurus shows what was previously an unknown stage in the evolution of abelisaurids, having only some of the cranial modifications and a unique combination of features in its forelimbs.