A system and method for image localization based on semantic segmentation are disclosed. A particular embodiment includes: receiving image data from an image generating device mounted on an autonomous vehicle; performing semantic segmentation or other object detection on the received image data to identify and label objects in the image data and produce semantic label image data; identifying extraneous objects in the semantic label image data; removing the extraneous objects from the semantic label image data; comparing the semantic label image data to a baseline semantic label map; and determining a vehicle location of the autonomous vehicle based on information in a matching baseline semantic label map.