The sori are enclosed (sometimes tightly) by reflexed laminar margins, also with membranous, often fugacious true indusia.

[1] Formerly, the two species in the genus Pentarhizidium were considered to be members of Matteuccia, but genetic analysis has determined that they compose a basal sister clade to the rest of the family.

[5] The following cladogram for the suborder Aspleniineae (as eupolypods II), based on Lehtonen (2011),[6] and Rothfels & al. (2012),[7] shows a likely phylogenetic relationship between the Onocleaceae and the other families of the clade.

Cystopteridaceae Rhachidosoraceae Diplaziopsidaceae Aspleniaceae Hemidictyaceae Thelypteridaceae Woodsiaceae Onocleaceae Blechnaceae Athyriaceae Four genera, with a total of five species, are accepted.

[2][8] A molecular phylogenetic analysis in 2011 suggested that the four Onocleacae genera are so closely related that they could be included under the single genus Onoclea.