 An analysis conducted by Swartz in 2012 found "Elpistostege" to be the sister taxon of "Tiktaalik".Both were found to be primitive members of the group Stegocephalia, along with other primitive stem-tetrapods.A 2020 paper instead recovers "Elpistostege" as the sister taxon of all tetrapods, crownward of "Tiktaalik"