This article is number 6 in a series of 21 articles on tools for evidence-informed health policy making. Local evidence is evidence that is available from a specific setting or settings in which a policy decision and action will be taken. Such evidence is always needed, alongside other forms of evidence, to inform health policy decisions. Global evidence is the best starting point for judgements about effects, and factors that modify those effects, as well as for insights into ways to approach and address problems. But local evidence is needed for most other judgements about what decisions and actions should be taken.