Domain, Kingdom, Phylum, Class, and Order

• All snapping turtles are classified within the Eukaryota domain. Organisms in Eukaryota all have cells with nuclei. Snapping turtles fall into kingdom Animalia, which includes all animals. The phylum for snapping turtles is Chordata, which includes all vertebrates. Snapping turtles are a member of class Reptilia and order Testudines, which is a taxonomic group that also includes other turtles, tortoises, and terrapins.
  
  

Family

• Snapping turtles are members of the family Chelydridae. Chelydridae is one of the fourteen families of organisms that fall within phylum Testudines. Unfortunately, most of the genera within Chelydridae are already extinct, including Hoplochelys, Gafsachelys, Chelydropsis, Acherontemys, and Chelydrops. The two surviving genera exclusively contain snapping turtles. The extinct genera also included snapping turtles that were native to Europe, Asia, and Africa.
  
  

Genus

• The two genera that contain the surviving species of snapping turtle are Chelydra and Macrochelys. Chelydra contains three species, while there is only one member of the Macrochelys genus. This lone species is named Macrochelys temminckii, or more commonly the alligator snapping turtle. The "endangered" status of the alligator snapping turtle is currently being reviewed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, but no conservation efforts have been put into effect.
  
  

Species

• The genera Chelydra contains the species that are commonly called the South American snapping turtle (Chelydra acutirostris), the Central American snapping turtle (Chelydra rossignonii), and the common snapping turtle (Chelydra serpentina). Both the South and Central American snapping turtles are considered to be subspecies of the common snapping turtle; they can be listed as such by placing the subspecies epithet after the specific epithet for clarity. However, most people drop the middle epithet when referring to snapping turtle taxonomy due to the few number of species in the genera.