Under the present classification, the bullet ant is a member of the genus "Paraponera" in the tribe Paraponerini, subfamily Paraponerinae. It is a member of the family Formicidae, belonging to the order Hymenoptera, It was once the sole member of its own genus and tribe until the extinct "Paraponera dieteri" was described in 1994 by the entomologist Cesare Baroni Urbani. The ant, described from Dominican amber, existed during the Early Miocene 15 to 45 million years ago. "P. dieteri" can be distinguished from "P. clavata" by its much narrower head, length, pronotum width, petiole width and other features. The good preservation of the fossil allowed comprehensive comparisons between the two species; the body sculpture of "P. dieteri" suggests that the genus as a whole exhibits a slow evolutionary rate.