The role of real-time elastography (RTE)-targeted biopsy in the detection and diagnosis of prostate cancer (PCa) remains controversial. We searched Medline, Embase, and Cochrane Library from inception to July 31, 2017 and used the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies (QUADAS-2) tool to assess the quality of the identified studies. We applied the relative sensitivity value to assess the diagnostic accuracy of RTE-targeted biopsy using the 10-core systematic biopsy as the reference standard. Seven studies comprising 5 cohorts and 2 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were included. Of the 5 cohorts that encompassed 698 participants, we found that RTE-targeted biopsy did not outperform systematic biopsy in either overall PCa detection (69.5% vs 80.5%, relative sensitivity 0.92, 95% CI 0.80-1.06) or for the initial biopsy (56.8% vs 64.0%, relative sensitivity 0.93, 95% CI 0.79-1.11). For the core-by-core analysis, more positive cores were detected by RTE-targeted biopsy than systematic biopsy (21% vs 11%, relative sensitivity 2.17, 95% CI 1.61-2.95). The 2 RCTs showed a favorable trend toward greater PCa detection when a combination of systematic biopsies and RTE-targeted biopsies was used than when systematic biopsy alone was used (45.5% vs 39.5%, risk ratio (RR) 1.18, 95% CI 0.98-1.43). Currently, there is not enough evidence to demonstrate that RTE-targeted biopsy can outperform systematic biopsy, but the combination of systematic and RTE-targeted biopsy may be a promising approach for improving PCa detection.