Saltopus elginensis is known only from a single partial skeleton lacking the skull, but including parts of the vertebral column, the forelimbs, the pelvis and the hindlimbs.

[1] The generic name is derived from Latin saltare, "to jump" and Greek πούς, pous, "foot".

[1] Saltopus has been variously identified as a saurischian (lizard-hipped) dinosaur, a more advanced theropod, and a close relative of the herrerasaurs, but its taxonomy has been in dispute because only fragmentary remains have been recovered.

[5] Some researchers, such as Gregory S. Paul,[6] have suggested it may represent a juvenile specimen of a coelophysid theropod such as Coelophysis or Procompsognathus.

[7] Michael Benton, continuing the studies of the late Alick Walker redescribing the fossil in 2011, found it to be a dinosauriform more derived than Lagosuchus.