We initiate the study of finite abelian groups that faithfully act on three-dimensional rationally connected varieties. We show that these groups can be naturally divided into three types. The first type consists of finite abelian groups that are products of two groups that belong to the Cremona group of rank 1 and 2, respectively; the second type consists of cyclic extensions of finite abelian groups acting on a K3 surface; the third type consists of groups that act on terminal Fano threefolds with empty anti-canonical linear system. We also establish a boundedness result for the groups of the second type.
