Aristosuchus was named by Seeley (1887). Its type is Poikilopleuron pusillus.

It was synonymized subjectively with Coelurus by von Zittel (1911); it was synonymized subjectively with Calamospondylus by Blows (1998).

It was assigned to Dinosauria by Seeley (1887); to Megalosauridae by Lydekker (1888); to Coelurosauria by Huene (1926); to Theropoda by Welles (1984); to Coeluridae by Lydekker (1889), Lydekker (1891), Marsh (1895), Huene (1909), Huene (1914), Huene (1914), Huene (1920), Huene (1923), Huene (1926), Swinton (1936), Romer (1956), Romer (1966), Steel (1970), Molnar (1980) and Carroll (1988); to Coelurosauridae by Grigorescu (1992); and to Compsognathidae by Naish (1999), Naish (2002), Peyer (2006) and Naish and Martill (2007).