[3] The first Procolophon fossil was discovered in the 1870s in Donnybrook, an area southwest of Pietermaritzburg in present-day Kwa-Zulu Natal of South Africa.

[4] Numerous other fossils have been recovered since from localities across the Eastern Cape and Free State provinces of South Africa.

Procolophon was considered to share a sister-taxon relationship with Tichvinskia, a procolophonid from the lower Triassic of Russia.

[11] The cladogram below follows a phylogenetic analysis by Modesto and Damiani (2007) in which Procolophon is defined in polytomy with Thelerpeton and Leptopleuroninae:[12] Owenetta rubidgei Barasaurus "Owenetta" kitchingorum Candelaria Coletta Sauropareion Contritosaurus Procolophon Thelerpeton Tichvinskia Scoloparia Leptopleuron Hypsognathus In their phylogenetic analyses, Butler et al. (2023) defined Procolophon as a sister taxon to Teratophon and Thelerpeton or only to Teratophon within Procolophoninae.

[17] Numerous subspecies and sister taxa are also found in the lower Triassic (Induan) of Germany, North America, and Russia.