An image classification algorithm based on adaptive feature weight updating is proposed to address the low classification accuracy of the current single-feature classification algorithms and simple multifeature fusion algorithms. The MapReduce parallel programming model on the Hadoop platform is used to perform an adaptive fusion of hue, local binary pattern (LBP) and scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT) features extracted from images to derive optimal combinations of weights. The support vector machine (SVM) classifier is then used to perform parallel training to obtain the optimal SVM classification model, which is then tested. The Pascal VOC 2012, Caltech 256 and SUN databases are adopted to build a massive image library. The speedup, classification accuracy and training time are tested in the experiment, and the results show that a linear growth tendency is present in the speedup of the system in a cluster environment. In consideration of the hardware costs, time, performance and accuracy, the algorithm is superior to mainstream classification algorithms, such as the power mean SVM and convolutional neural network (CNN). As the number and types of images both increase, the classification accuracy rate exceeds 95%. When the number of images reaches 80,000, the training time of the proposed algorithm is only 1/5 that of traditional single-node architecture algorithms. This result reflects the effectiveness of the algorithm, which provides a basis for the effective analysis and processing of image big data.