Furry lobsters (sometimes called coral lobsters) are small decapod crustaceans, closely related to the slipper lobsters and spiny lobsters.

[1] The antennae are not as enlarged as in spiny and slipper lobsters, and the body is covered in short hairs, hence the name furry lobster.

Although previously considered a family in their own right (Synaxidae Spence Bate, 1881), the furry lobsters were subsumed into the family Palinuridae in 1990.

[2] Subsequent molecular phylogenetics studies have confirmed that the furry lobsters genera don't form a natural group and were both nested among the spiny lobster genera in family Palinuridae.

[1] The family now includes the two furry lobster genera and ten spiny lobster genera.