Systems, methods, and other embodiments associated with indexing spatial data in a distributed file system using local indexes are described. In one embodiment, a method includes dividing the spatial data into splits. Each of the splits includes a portion of the spatial data and includes additional sub-units that further sub-divide the spatial data. The example method may also include populating index records for the sub-units using metadata extracted from the spatial data. The metadata for each of the sub-units describes sub-unit characteristics of a respective one of the sub-units and split characteristics of one of the splits associated with the respective one of the sub-units. The method includes indexing the spatial data by generating local indexes using the index records with one of the local indexes for each of the splits and generating a global index that identifies the local indexes.