diff --git a/search/frontendsearchpipeline.py b/search/frontendsearchpipeline.py
index b606672..ac7fd4c 100644
--- a/search/frontendsearchpipeline.py
+++ b/search/frontendsearchpipeline.py
@@ -950,8 +950,10 @@
     UserRPC for the created RPC call.
   """
   shard_id, subquery = shard_key
+  protocol = 'https' if not settings.local_mode else 'http'
   backend_host = modules.get_hostname(module='default')
-  url = 'https://%s%s' % (
+  url = '%s://%s%s' % (
+      protocol,
       backend_host,
       framework_helpers.FormatURL(
           [],
@@ -980,8 +982,9 @@
     project_id, logged_in_user_id, shard_id, invalidation_timestep,
     deadline=None, failfast=True):
   """Ask a backend to query one shard of the database."""
+  protocol = 'https' if not settings.local_mode else 'http'
   backend_host = modules.get_hostname(module='default')
-  url = 'https://%s%s' % (backend_host, framework_helpers.FormatURL(
+  url = '%s://%s%s' % (protocol, backend_host, framework_helpers.FormatURL(
       None, urls.BACKEND_NONVIEWABLE,
       project_id=project_id or '',
       logged_in_user_id=logged_in_user_id or '',