Přes obrovský pokrok v molekulárních fylogenetických metodách a množství v nedávné době objevených fosilních taxonů nemáme o fylogenezi a evoluci mravenců (čeleď Formicidae) mnoho ověřených faktů. V současnosti se rozlišuje 16 žijících a tři fosilní podčeledi. Podčeleď Leptanillinae je považována za bazální, zatímco skupina Apoidea (včely a kutilky) se ukazuje jako sesterská k čeledi mravenců.

Citovaná a základní doporučená literatura:
Barden P., Grimaldi D. (2014): A diverse ant fauna from the Mid-Cretaceous of Myanmar (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). PloS One 9 (4): e93627
Bolton B. (2014): An Online Catalog of the Ants of the World. www.antcat.org
Brady S. G., Schultz T. R., Fisher B. L., Ward P. S. (2006) Evaluating alternative hypotheses for the early evolution and diversification of ants. PNAS 103: 18172–18177
Brady S. G., Fisher B. L., Schultz T. R., Ward P.S. (2014) The rise of army ants and their relatives: diversification of specialised predatory doryline ants. BMC Evolutionary Biology 14 (93) doi:10.1186/1471-2148-14-93
Hölldobler B., Wilson E. O. (1990) The Ants. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Hölldobler B., Wilson E. O. (1997) Cesta k mravencům. Academia, Praha
Johnson B. R., Borowiec M. L., Chiu J. C., Lee E. K., Atallah J., Ward P. S. (2013) Phylogenomics resolves evolutionary relationships among ants, bees, and wasps. Current Biology 23, 2058–2062
Keller L. (2009)
Kück et al. (2011)
LaPolla J. S, Dlussky G. M., Perichot V. (2013) Ants and the fossil record. Annual Review of Entomology 58: 609–630
López F., Matínez M. D., Barandica J. M. (1994) Four new species of the genus Leptanilla (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) from Spain – relationships to other species and ecological issues. Sociobiology 24: 179–212
McKellar et al. (2013)
Moreau C. S., Belt C. D., Vila R., Archibald S. B., Pierce N. E. (2006) Phylogeny of the ants: Diversification in the age of Angioperms. Science 312: 101–104
Perichot V., Lacau S., Nérandeau D., Nel A. (2008) Fossil evidence for early ant evolution Naturwissenschaften 95: 85–90
Pie M. R., Tschá M. T. (2009) The macroevolutionary dynamics of ant diversification. Evolution 63 (11): 3023–3030
Schmidt C. A. (2009) Molecular phylogenetics and taxonomic revision of Ponerinae ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae: Ponerinae). Ph.D. study, The University of Arizona
Schultz T. R. (2000) In search of ant ancestors. PNAS 97: 14028–14029
Soudek Š. (1922) Mravenci. Soustava, zeměpisné rozšíření, oekologie a určovací klíč mravenců žijících na území Československé republiky. Praha.
Ward P. S. (2007) Phylogeny, classification, and species-level taxonomy of ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Zootaxa 1668: 549–563
Wheeler W. M. (1917) Phylogenetic development of subapterous and apterous castes in the Formicidae. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 3 (2): 109–117
Wilson E. O., Hölldobler B. (2005) The rise of the ants: A phylogenetic and ecological explanation. PNAS 102: 7411–7414

In contrast to the huge progress of molecular phylogenetic methods and many re­cently discovered fossil taxa, the phylogeny and evolution of ants (Formicidae) remains poorly understood. Today 16 extant and three fossil ant subfamilies are known. The subfamily Leptanillinae is considered as basal, while Apoidea seems to be a sister family to the ants.