PROSPECTUS SUMMARY

The following summary is qualified in its entirety by, and should be read in conjunction with, the more detailed information and financial statements appearing elsewhere in this prospectus. In addition to this summary, we urge you to read the entire prospectus carefully, especially the risks of investing in our ADSs discussed under “Risk Factors,” before deciding whether to buy our ADSs.

Our Business

We are the leading online destination for automobile consumers in China. Through our two websites, autohome.com.cn and che168.com, we deliver comprehensive, independent and interactive content to automobile buyers and owners. Autohome.com.cn ranked first among China’s automotive websites and automotive channels of internet portals in terms of average daily unique visitors, average daily time spent per user and average daily page views in the nine months ended September 2013, based on data published by iResearch, a third-party market research firm, or iResearch Public Data. In the same period, autohome.com.cn accounted for approximately 46% of the total time that China’s internet users spent viewing online automotive information, more than four times that of our closest competitor, according to the iResearch Public Data. We have developed a strong and well-recognized brand. Our “ ” (“Autohome”) brand has been the most searched automotive-related keyword during substantially the entire period since July 2011 on Baidu.com, the leading Chinese language internet search engine.

Our ability to reach a large and engaged user base of automobile consumers has made us a preferred platform for automakers and dealers to conduct their advertising campaigns. We generate substantially all of our revenues from online advertising services and dealer subscription services with automakers contributing the substantial majority of our total net revenues. We have a high penetration rate in the automaker market, with approximately 80% of over 80 automakers operating in China having advertised on our websites in each of 2010, 2011, 2012 and the nine months ended September 30, 2013. In addition, a large and rapidly growing number of dealers are purchasing our advertising services and subscription services, through which they showcase and market their inventories on our websites.

We believe our focus on user experience, innovation and high-quality content distinguishes us from our competitors and is the foundation for our long-term success. Content we provide to our users includes:

Our professionally produced and user generated content, comprehensive automobile library and extensive automobile listing information have attracted a large and engaged user base. This, in turn, represents a highly relevant audience that is receptive to automotive advertising. We believe that this user base, together with our nationwide advertising platform, targeted advertising solutions and value-added services, has led to our rapid growth and has laid the foundation for our continuing success.

We develop our business model and technology platforms around the consumer automobile ownership life cycle and our automaker and dealer customers’ sales cycle. The consumer automobile ownership life cycle has the following stages: research, purchase, maintenance and replacement. The sales cycle of our customers has the following corresponding stages: pre-sale marketing and advertising, sales leads generation, after-market sales and replacement sales. Our current business mainly serves the research and purchase stages of the consumer automobile ownership life cycle and the pre-sale marketing and advertising and sales leads generation stages of our customers’ sales cycle. We have been developing other services and technology platforms to capture additional revenue opportunities in the automobile maintenance and replacement stages of the consumer automobile ownership life cycle and the corresponding stages of our customers’ sales cycle.

We have experienced significant revenue growth while maintaining profitability. Our net revenues increased from RMB252.9 million in 2010 to RMB433.2 million in 2011 and RMB732.5 million (US$119.7 million) in 2012, representing a compound annual growth rate, or CAGR, of 70.2%. Our total net revenues grew to RMB830.6 million (US$135.7 million) for the nine months ended September 30, 2013, representing a 62.6% increase from RMB510.8 million in the same period in 2012. Our income from continuing operations increased from RMB80.4 million in 2010 to RMB135.4 million in 2011 and RMB212.9 million (US$34.8 million) in 2012, representing a CAGR of 62.7%. Our net income amounted to RMB333.5 million (US$54.5 million) for the nine months ended September 30, 2013, representing a 96.7% increase from RMB169.6 million in the same period in 2012.

Our Industry

The online automotive advertising market in China has achieved rapid growth as a result of the concurrent development of China’s automotive and internet industries. China is the world’s largest passenger car market as measured by sales volume of new cars in 2012, according to LMC Automotive, a third-party industry research firm. The number of new passenger cars sold in China is expected to grow from 14.2 million units in 2012 to 20.7 million units by 2015, representing a CAGR of 13.3%, according to LMC Automotive. At the same time, China has the largest internet population in the world, which increased from 298.0 million in 2008 to 590.6 million at the end of June 2013, according to the China Internet Network Information Center, or the CNNIC. China’s growing population of automobile consumers increasingly relies on the internet as a source of automotive information. As a result, China’s automotive websites and automotive channels of internet portals have experienced rapid user growth. According to the iResearch Public Data, average daily unique visitors to automotive websites and automotive channels of internet portals increased from 5.8 million in December 2008 to 26.1 million in September 2013. The aggregate time spent by internet users in China visiting automotive websites and automotive channels of internet portals increased from 20.9 million hours in December 2008 to 100.6 million hours in September 2013, according to the iResearch Public Data. The number of monthly page views of automotive websites and automobile channels of internet portals in China increased from 1.5 billion in December 2008 to 8.8 billion in September 2013, according to the iResearch Public Data.

Automakers and dealers have therefore increasingly used the internet for brand advertising and product promotions. According to our commissioned report prepared by iResearch, or the iResearch Commissioned Report, automakers and their franchise dealers spent RMB2,370 million in 2009 on online advertising in China, which increased to RMB5,600 million in 2012, representing a CAGR of 33.2%. This growth outpaced their spending on traditional media, including television, print and radio, which increased at a CAGR of 8.9% during the same period, according to the iResearch Commissioned Report. It is expected that spending on online advertising will continue to grow at a more rapid pace than traditional media in the future.

Automotive websites have increased their share of total online automotive advertising spending. Online advertising spending on automotive websites accounted for 37.1% of total online advertising expenditures by automaker and dealer advertisers in 2012, increasing from 30.0% in 2009, according to the iResearch Commissioned Report. It is expected that revenue growth of automotive websites will continue to be driven by growth in new and used car sales as well as growth in sales of related products and services.

Our Strengths

We believe that the following competitive strengths contribute to our success and differentiate us from our competitors:

Our Strategies

Our goal is to become the dominant player in China’s online automotive advertising market. We intend to achieve this goal by implementing the following strategies:

Our Challenges

The successful execution of our strategies is subject to risks and uncertainties related to our business and industry, including those relating to our ability to:

In addition, we are subject to risks and uncertainties related to our corporate structure and doing business in China, including risks associated with:

See “Risk Factors” and other information included in this prospectus for a discussion of these and other risks and uncertainties associated with our business and investing in our ADSs.

Corporate History and Structure

Autohome Inc., or Autohome, was incorporated under the laws of the Cayman Islands under its former name, Sequel Limited, in June 2008 and adopted its current name in October 2011. Shortly after its inception, in June 2008, Autohome acquired all of the equity interests of the following entities:

Our largest shareholder is Telstra Holdings Pty Ltd., or Telstra Holdings, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Telstra Corporation Limited, the leading diversified telecommunications company in Australia and a Fortune Global 500 company.

To sharpen our business focus on the automotive industry, we completed a corporate reorganization in 2011 by spinning off our then subsidiaries that were not involved in our core business. In March 2011, we completed the transfer of the che168.com business from Norstar to Cheerbright. In June 2011, we contributed our entire equity interests in Norstar and China Topside to Sequel Media Inc., or Sequel Media, our Cayman Islands subsidiary. We then immediately distributed shares of Sequel Media to our shareholders.

PRC laws and regulations currently limit foreign ownership of companies that engage in internet and advertising services. We therefore conduct our operations in China primarily through contractual agreements between our wholly-owned PRC subsidiary, Beijing Cheerbright Technologies Co., Ltd., or Autohome WFOE, and each of the three groups of entities and individuals—(i) Beijing Autohome Information Technology Co., Ltd., or Autohome Information, shareholders of Autohome Information and three subsidiaries of Autohome Information: Beijing Shengtuo Hongyuan Information Technology Co., Ltd., or Hongyuan Information, Beijing Shengtuo Chengshi Advertising Co., Ltd., or Chengshi Advertising, and Beijing Shengtuo Autohome Advertising Co., Ltd., or Autohome Advertising, (ii) Shanghai You Che You Jia Advertising Co., Ltd., or Shanghai Advertising, and shareholders of Shanghai Advertising, and (iii) Guangzhou You Che You Jia Advertising Co., Ltd, or Guangzhou Advertising, and shareholders of Guangzhou Advertising.

These contractual arrangements enable us, through Autohome WFOE, to:

As a result of these contractual arrangements, we, through Autohome WFOE, are the primary beneficiary of these three groups of entities and treat them as our “variable interest entities”, or VIEs, under the generally accepted accounting principles in the United States, or U.S. GAAP. We have consolidated the financial results of the VIEs in our consolidated financial statements in accordance with U.S. GAAP.

There are certain risks associated with conducting our operations through contractual arrangements. For example, if the PRC government determines that the agreements that establish the structure for operating our services in China do not comply with PRC governmental restrictions on foreign investment in internet and advertising businesses, or if these regulations or the interpretation of existing regulations change in the future, we could be subject to severe penalties or be forced to relinquish our interests in those operations. Our contractual arrangements with our VIEs may not be as effective in providing operational control as direct ownership. Any failure by our VIEs or their shareholders to perform their obligations under our contractual arrangements with them would have a material adverse effect on our business and financial condition. For a detailed description of the risks associated with our corporate structure and the contractual arrangements underlying our corporate structure, see “Risk Factors—Risks Related to Our Corporate Structure.”

In October 2013, our wholly-owned subsidiary in Hong Kong, Autohome (Hong Kong) Limited, or Autohome HK, acquired Prbrownies Marketing Limited, or Prbrownies Marketing, a Hong Kong advertising and marketing company. Prbrownies Marketing has engaged in advertising business outside the PRC for more than three years, and is therefore qualified to directly invest in a PRC company providing advertising services in accordance with PRC laws. Prbrownies Marketing has established subsidiaries in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. We plan to gradually migrate our advertising business from our VIEs to Prbrownies and its subsidiaries, a transition we expect to complete in the next three to four years.

The following diagram illustrates our corporate structure as of the date of this prospectus:

Share Purchase from West Crest Limited

On October 30, 2013, West Crest Limited and its sole shareholder Mr. Jiang Lan informed our shareholders that they had received a binding written offer from one of our major competitors to purchase 6,684,711 ordinary shares of our company held by West Crest Limited for a total purchase price of US$130 million. Mr. Lan was a director of our company and 6,684,711 ordinary shares beneficially owned by Mr. Lan constituted approximately 6.7% of our then total issued and outstanding shares. Should we allow our competitor to acquire a significant stake in our company while we are a private unlisted company, we believe the competitor may obtain our confidential business information and gain influence over our corporate strategy and the right to vote on our significant matters requiring shareholder approval. In the interest of our company, our board of directors and all of our existing shareholders unanimously approved our and Telstra’s proposed purchase of all of our shares held by West Crest Limited for US$130 million in cash, or the West Crest Share Purchase. On November 4, 2013, we and Telstra Holdings entered into a share purchase agreement with West Crest Limited, Mr. Jiang Lan and other shareholders of our company. Pursuant to the agreement, we and Telstra Holdings purchased 3,856,564 and 2,828,147 ordinary shares of our company held by West Crest Limited for US$75 million and US$55 million, respectively, in cash. Fifty percent of our company’s purchase price was paid on November 21, 2013, and the remainder will be paid no later than February 4, 2014. Mr. Lan has resigned from our board of directors upon signing of the agreement, and all other shareholders have agreed not to transfer shares of our company held by them from the date of the agreement until 180 days after the date of the final prospectus for this offering. We paid our first installment of US$37.5 million by obtaining U.S. dollar financing from a third-party lender and pledging the approximate corresponding amount of our existing RMB cash balance to the lender as collateral. We intend to use part of the proceeds from this offering to pay the remaining purchase price of US$37.5 million, although we believe our existing cash balance and expected cash from operating activities would be sufficient to fund the entire purchase price and our business operations and liquidity would not be materially adversely affected by the West Crest Share Purchase. The West Crest Share Purchase has an impact on our earnings per share and capitalization. See “—Pro Forma Earnings Per Share to Reflect the West Crest Share Purchase” and “Capitalization.”

Corporate Information

Our principal executive offices are located at 10th Floor Tower B, CEC Plaza, 3 Dan Ling Street, Haidian District, Beijing, 100080, China. Our telephone number at this address is (+86) 10-5985-7001. Our registered office in the Cayman Islands is located at the office of Codan Trust Company (Cayman) Limited, Cricket Square, Hutchins Drive, P.O. Box 2681, Grand Cayman KY1-111, Cayman Islands.

Investors should submit any inquiries to the address and telephone number of our principal executive offices. Our corporate website is www.autohome.com.cn. The information contained on this website is not a part of this prospectus. Our agent for service of process in the United States is Law Debenture Corporate Services Inc.

Our Dual-class Shareholding Structure

As of the date of this prospectus, our outstanding share capital consists of ordinary shares. Upon the effectiveness of the registration statement of which this prospectus forms a part, our ordinary shares will be redeemed and canceled in consideration for the issuance to their holders of Class A ordinary shares and Class B ordinary shares. Holders of Class A and Class B ordinary shares will have the same rights, including dividend rights, except for conversion and voting rights. Each Class B ordinary share may be converted into one Class A ordinary share at any time by its holder, while Class A ordinary shares cannot be converted into Class B ordinary shares under any circumstances. Each Class A ordinary share is entitled to one vote. When the total number of ordinary shares held by Telstra constitutes no less than 51% of all of our issued and outstanding ordinary shares, each Class B ordinary share is entitled to one vote; when the total number of ordinary shares held by Telstra drops below 51% but is no less than 39.3% of all of our issued and outstanding ordinary shares, each Class B ordinary share will carry such number of votes that would result in the total number of ordinary shares held by

Telstra carrying, in the aggregate, 51% of the voting rights represented by all of our issued and outstanding ordinary shares; when the total number of ordinary shares held by Telstra drops below 39.3% of all of our issued and outstanding ordinary shares, all Class B ordinary shares will be automatically converted into the same number of Class A ordinary shares. The ADSs being sold in this offering represent Class A ordinary shares. See ‘‘Description of Share Capital—Ordinary Shares’’ for more detailed description of our Class A ordinary shares and Class B ordinary shares.

After the completion of this offering, Telstra will continue to retain a majority of our aggregate voting rights due to its equity interests in our company and our dual-class share structure. Telstra will hold 68,788,940 Class B ordinary shares, representing 66.2% of our aggregate voting rights, immediately after the completion of this offering, assuming the underwriters do not exercise their option to purchase additional ADSs. Upon the transfer of any Class B ordinary share to any person that is not an affiliate of Telstra, such Class B ordinary share will be automatically and immediately converted into one Class A ordinary share. If immediately following the transfer of any ordinary shares held by Telstra to any party that is not an affiliate of Telstra, Telstra holds less than 51% of our total number of outstanding shares, each issued Class B ordinary share will be automatically converted into one Class A ordinary share.

So long as Telstra holds at least 51% of our voting rights, Telstra will be entitled to appoint at least a majority of our directors. After the completion of this offering, we will be a controlled company as defined under the New York Stock Exchange Listed Company Manual, or the NYSE Listed Company Manual.

Conventions that Apply to this Prospectus

Unless otherwise indicated or the context otherwise requires, references in this prospectus to:

Unless the context indicates otherwise, all information in this prospectus assumes no exercise by the underwriters of their option to purchase additional ADSs.

Implications of Being an Emerging Growth Company

As a company with less than US$1.0 billion in revenue for our last fiscal year, we qualify as an “emerging growth company” pursuant to the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act of 2012, or the JOBS Act. An emerging growth company may take advantage of specified reduced reporting and other requirements that are otherwise applicable generally to public companies. These provisions include exemption from the auditor attestation requirement under Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, or Section 404, in the assessment of the emerging growth company’s internal control over financial reporting. The JOBS Act also provides that an emerging growth company does not need to comply with any new or revised financial accounting standards until such date that a private company is otherwise required to comply with such new or revised accounting standards. However, we have elected to “opt out” of this provision and, as a result, we will comply with new or revised accounting standards as required when they are adopted for public companies. This decision to opt out of the extended transition period under the JOBS Act is irrevocable.

We will remain an emerging growth company until the earliest of (a) the last day of our fiscal year during which we have total annual gross revenues of at least US$1.0 billion; (b) the last day of our fiscal year following the fifth anniversary of the completion of this offering; (c) the date on which we have, during the previous three-year period, issued more than US$1.0 billion in non-convertible debt; or (d) the date on which we are deemed to be a “large accelerated filer” under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, or the Exchange Act, which would occur if the market value of our ADSs that are held by non-affiliates exceeds US$700 million as of the last business day of our most recently completed second fiscal quarter. Once we cease to be an emerging growth company, we will not be entitled to the exemptions provided in the JOBS Act discussed above.

The Offering

The number of ordinary shares that will be outstanding immediately after this offering excludes:

Summary Consolidated Financial Data

The following summary consolidated statement of comprehensive income data for the years ended December 31, 2010, 2011 and 2012 and our selected consolidated balance sheet data as of December 31, 2011 and 2012 have been derived from our consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus. The following summary consolidated balance sheet data as of December 31, 2009 and 2010 and the summary consolidated statement of comprehensive income data for 2009 presented below have been derived from our consolidated financial statements not included in this prospectus. Our consolidated financial statements are prepared in accordance with U.S. GAAP. The following summary consolidated statements of comprehensive income data presented below for the period between June 23, 2008, the date of formation of our holding company, and December 31, 2008 and our balance sheet data as of December 31, 2008 have been derived from our unaudited financial statements not included in this prospectus. Our summary consolidated statements of comprehensive income data presented below for the nine months ended September 30, 2012 and 2013 and our balance sheet data as of September 30, 2013 have been derived from our unaudited interim condensed consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this prospectus.

We adopted ASU 2011-05, Presentation of Comprehensive Income, on January 1, 2012 by presenting items of net profit and other comprehensive income in one continuous statement, the Consolidated Statements of Comprehensive Income. Our consolidated financial statements for the three years ended December 31, 2012 and our unaudited interim condensed consolidated financial statements for the nine months ended September 30, 2013 included elsewhere in this prospectus have been revised to conform with the presentation requirements of ASU 2011-05.

To sharpen our business focus on the automotive industry, we completed a corporate reorganization on June 30, 2011 by spinning off our then subsidiaries that were not involved in our core business. The spun-off business has been accounted for as discontinued operations whereby the results of operations of the spun-off business have been eliminated from the results of continuing operations and reported in discontinued operations for all periods presented. The following summary consolidated balance sheet data as of December 31, 2008, 2009 and 2010 includes assets and liabilities associated with the entities we spun off and the summary consolidated balance sheet data as of December 31, 2011, 2012 and September 30, 2013 excludes assets and liabilities associated with the entities we spun off.

Our historical results do not necessarily indicate results expected for any future periods.

Pro Forma Earnings Per Share to Reflect the West Crest Share Purchase

Our basic earnings per share on a pro forma basis to reflect the West Crest Share Purchase were RMB2.21 (US$0.36) for the year ended December 31, 2012 and RMB3.46 (US$0.57) for the nine months ended September 30, 2013. Our diluted earnings per share on a pro forma basis to reflect the West Crest Share Purchase were RMB2.19 (US$0.36) for the year ended December 31, 2012 and RMB3.41 (US$0.56) for the nine months ended September 30, 2013. The denominator used for pro forma earnings per share is calculated by subtracting the 3,856,564 shares repurchased by our company from West Crest from the number of our ordinary shares outstanding used in the basic and diluted earnings per share computation as of December 31, 2012 and September 30, 2013.

Summary Consolidated Balance Sheet Data

Non-GAAP Financial Measures

To supplement net income from continuing operations presented in accordance with U.S. GAAP, we present adjusted net income and adjusted EBITDA, which are non-GAAP financial measures. We define adjusted net income as income from continuing operations excluding share-based compensation expenses and amortization expenses of intangible assets related to acquisitions. We define adjusted EBITDA as income from continuing operations before income tax expense (benefit), depreciation expenses of property and equipment and amortization expenses of intangible assets, excluding share-based compensation expenses. We present these non-GAAP financial measures because they are used by our management to evaluate our operating performance, in addition to net income from continuing operations prepared in accordance with U.S. GAAP.

Adjusted net income and adjusted EBITDA have material limitations as analytical tools. One of the limitations of using these non-GAAP financial measures is that they do not include share-based compensation expenses, which are and will continue to be a recurring expense in our business. Furthermore, because adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net income are not calculated in the same manner by all companies, they may not be comparable to other similarly titled measures used by other companies. In light of the foregoing limitations, you should not consider adjusted net income or adjusted EBITDA as a substitute for or superior to income from continuing operations prepared in accordance with U.S. GAAP. We encourage investors and others to review our financial information in its entirety and not rely on a single financial measure.

We compensate for these limitations by relying primarily on our U.S. GAAP results and using adjusted net income and adjusted EBITDA only as supplemental measures. Our adjusted net income and adjusted EBITDA are calculated as follows for the periods presented: