Radiographic positioning in reptiles remains a subject of confusion amongst clinicians. In turtles, it has been demonstrated that positioning them in lateral recumbency will result in significant positional artifacts due to lung compression and organ shifting and therefore reduces the sensitivity and specificity of radiographs in the diagnosis of a variety of coelomic organ diseases. However, in lizards, while the same is suspected, many clinicians continue to position lizards in lateral recumbency to obtain lateral radiographs. Therefore, in a prospective study, ten bearded dragons were used to evaluate the effect of body position on lung volume changes and shifting of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, when compared to the baseline obtained in ventral recumbency. Under sedation, computed tomography was performed to measure changes in lung volume and gastrointestinal tract positioning pre- and post-enterography. Iohexol was administered by gastric gavage (15 ml/kg) to better delineate the gastrointestinal tract. Animals were positioned in ventral recumbency followed by left lateral, right lateral, and dorsal recumbency in a randomized order. In both right and left lateral recumbency, the dependent lung was severely decreased in volume and a compensatory increase in the non-dependent lung volume was noted. Following iohexol administration, lung volume was reduced by ~ 50 % in each recumbency, indicating that GI filling has a significant effect on lung volume. In conclusion, positioning bearded dragons in lateral recumbency for radiographs will result in significant positional artifacts, therefore animals should remain in ventral recumbency and the radiographic beam moved horizontally to obtain diagnostic radiographs.