合弓纲（Synapsida）意为「固定的颧弓」，也被称成兽形纲（Theropsida），是羊膜动物的一纲，包含羊膜动物中所有与哺乳类关系较近的物种。合弓纲是羊膜动物的两个主要演化支之一，另一个演化支为蜥形纲（Sauropsida）。牠们在头骨的两侧各有一个下颞孔。

在传统的分类法中，合弓纲曾是爬行动物的一个亚纲，称为单孔亚纲、下孔亚纲，或名似哺乳爬行动物。

合弓纲出现在3亿2400万年前的晚石炭纪，并成为二叠纪中到晚期的优势陆地动物，数量众多且多样化。二叠纪-三叠纪灭绝事件发生时，许多早期合弓类动物消失，少数物种存活到三叠纪，而主龙类爬行动物迅速成为三叠纪的优势陆地动物。合弓纲在三叠纪以后渐趋绝灭，只有少数物种存活到白垩纪。现今的哺乳类是合弓纲的后代。

Synapsids (Greek, 'fused arch'), synonymous with theropsids (Greek, 'beast-face'), are a group of animals that includes mammals and every animal more closely related to mammals than to other living amniotes. They are easily separated from other amniotes by having a temporal fenestra, an opening low in the skull roof behind each eye, leaving a bony arch beneath each; this accounts for their name. Primitive synapsids are usually called pelycosaurs or pelycosaur-grade synapsids; more advanced mammal-like ones, therapsids. The non-mammalian members are described as mammal-like reptiles in classical systematics; they can also be called stem mammals or proto-mammals. Synapsids evolved from basal amniotes and are one of the two major groups of the later amniotes; the other is the sauropsids, a group that includes modern reptiles and birds. The distinctive temporal fenestra developed in the ancestral synapsid about 312 million years ago, during the Late Carboniferous period.