Protopsephurus is an extinct genus of paddlefish containing the single species Protopsephurus liui, known from the Yixian, Jiufotang and Huajiying formations in Liaoning, northern China from the Barremian to Aptian ages of the Early Cretaceous period around 125-120 million years ago.

Like other extinct polyodontids, it also has tiny non-interlocking scales approximately 1 mm in diameter called denticles that cover the trunk, which bear a fringe of spikes.

Piscivory is likely the ancestral ecology of paddlefish, with only the genus Polyodon making the transition to being planktivorous filter feeders.

Eduard von Martens, a German zoologist and the first person to describe its living relative the Chinese Paddlefish, did not provide a definition on the meaning of the binomial name.

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