The relationships of the Sapayoa (Sapayoa aenigma) has for decades been a mystery and it has been shuffled around between different New World families like Manakins and Tyrants.

Now genetic studies have finally resolved that the Sapayoa is most closely related to the broadbills, asities and pittas of Asia and Africa. It has been isolated from its Old World relatives since at least the early Eocene and is the last surviving New World species of a lineage that evolved in Australia-New Guinea when Gondwana was in the process of splitting apart. The Sapayoa's ancestors probably reached South America via the Western Antarctica Peninsula. It is now placed in its own family Sapayoidae.

Today the Sapayoa can be found in lowland rainforests in Panamá and northwest South America.