Armadillos are part of the superorder Xenarthra. Two orders make up this superorder. Armadillos are in the order Cingulata, and sloths and anteaters are in the order Pilosa. It is no surprise that all three of these animals live in South America. That is where they originated from about 50 million years ago.
The earliest armadillos were about the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. No modern armadillo is anywhere close to that big. Instead, there are twenty-one modern species of armadillo. All range from about 5 inches long (the pink fairy armadillo) to 59 inches long (the giant armadillo).
There is clearly a lot of variety in the twenty-one species of armadillo. However, only one species lives in the United States. That is the nine-banded armadillo. You can find these armadillos all over the southeastern United States. As the weather warms, they have been moving north. Some have even been spotted in Illinois and Nebraska.