SCHA Schwab US Small Cap

Investment objective

The fund’s goal is to track as closely as possible, before fees and expenses, the total return of the Dow Jones U.S. Broad Stock Market Index ^SM .

Fund fees and expenses

This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy and hold shares of the fund. The table does not reflect brokerage commissions you may incur when buying or selling fund shares.

This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the fund with the cost of investing in other funds. The example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all of your shares at the end of those time periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the fund’s operating expenses remain the same. This example does not reflect any brokerage commissions you may incur when buying or selling fund shares. Your actual costs may be higher or lower.

The fund pays transaction costs, such as commissions, when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in the annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 5% of the average value of its portfolio.

Principal investment strategies

To pursue its goal, the fund generally invests in stocks that are included in the Dow Jones U.S. Broad Stock Market Index ^{SM 1} . The index includes the largest 2,500 publicly traded U.S. companies for which pricing information is readily available. The index is a float-adjusted market capitalization weighted index that reflects the shares of securities actually available to investors in the marketplace. As of August 31, 2012, the index was composed of 2,510 stocks.

It is the fund’s policy that under normal circumstances it will invest at least 90% of its net assets in these stocks. The fund will notify its shareholders at least 60 days before changing this policy. The fund may sell securities that are represented in the index in anticipation of their removal from the index, or buy securities that are not yet represented in the index in anticipation of their addition to the index.

Under normal circumstances, the fund may invest up to 10% of its net assets in securities not included in its index. The principal types of these investments include those that the Adviser believes will help the fund track the index, such as investments in (a) securities that are not represented in the index but the Adviser anticipates will be added to the index or as necessary to reflect various corporate actions (such as mergers and spin-offs), (b) other investment companies, and (c) derivatives, principally futures contracts. The fund may use futures contracts and other derivatives primarily to seek returns on the fund’s otherwise uninvested cash assets to help

it better track the index. The fund may also invest in cash and cash equivalents, and may lend its securities to minimize the difference in performance that naturally exists between an index fund and its corresponding index.

Because it may not be possible or practicable to purchase all of the stocks in the index, the Adviser seeks to track the total return of the index by using statistical sampling techniques. These techniques involve investing in a limited number of index securities which, when taken together, are expected to perform similarly to the index as a whole. These techniques are based on a variety of factors, including performance attributes, tax considerations, capitalization, dividend yield, price/earnings ratio, industry factors, risk factors and other characteristics. The fund generally expects that its portfolio will hold less than the total number of securities in the index, but reserves the right to hold as many securities as it believes necessary to achieve the fund’s investment objective. The fund generally expects that its industry weightings, dividend yield and price/earnings ratio will be similar to those of the index.

The fund will concentrate its investments ( i.e. , hold 25% or more of its total assets) in a particular industry, group of industries or sector to approximately the same extent that its index is so concentrated. For purposes of this limitation, securities of the U.S. government (including its agencies and instrumentalities), and repurchase agreements collateralized by U.S. government securities are not considered to be issued by members of any industry.

The Adviser seeks to achieve, over time, a correlation between the fund’s performance and that of its index, before fees and expenses, of 95% or better. However, there can be no guarantee that the fund will achieve a high degree of correlation with the index. A number of factors may affect the fund’s ability to achieve a high correlation with its index, including the degree to which the fund utilizes a sampling technique. The correlation between the performance of the fund and its index may also diverge due to transaction costs, asset valuations, corporate actions (such as mergers and spin-offs), timing variances, and differences between the fund’s portfolio and the index resulting from legal restrictions (such as diversification requirements) that apply to the fund but not to the index.

Principal risks

The fund is subject to risks, any of which could cause an investor to lose money. The fund’s principal risks include:

Market Risk.  Stock markets rise and fall daily. As with any investment whose performance is tied to these markets, the value of your investment in the fund will fluctuate, which means that you could lose money.

Investment Style Risk.  The fund is not actively managed. Therefore, the fund follows the securities included in the index during upturns as well as downturns. Because of its indexing strategy, the fund does not take steps to reduce market exposure or to lessen the effects of a declining market. In addition, because of the fund’s expenses, the fund’s performance is normally below that of the index.

Equity Risk.  The prices of equity securities rise and fall daily. These price movements may result from factors affecting individual companies, industries or the securities market as a whole. In addition, equity markets tend to move in cycles, which may cause stock prices to fall over short or extended periods of time.

Large-Cap and Mid-Cap Risk.  Both large- and mid-cap stocks tend to go in and out of favor based on market and economic conditions. However, stocks of mid-cap companies tend to be more vulnerable to adverse business or economic events than larger more established companies. During a period when large- and mid-cap U.S. stocks fall behind other types of investments — small-cap stocks, for instance — the fund’s large- and mid-cap holdings could reduce performance.

Small-Cap Risk.  Historically, small-cap stocks have been riskier than large- and mid-cap stocks, and their prices may move sharply, especially during market upturns and downturns. Small-cap companies may be more vulnerable to adverse business or economic events than larger, more established companies. During a period when small-cap stocks fall behind other types of investments — large-cap and mid-cap stocks, for instance — the fund’s small-cap holdings could reduce performance.

Sampling Index Tracking Risk.  The fund may not fully replicate the index and may hold securities not included in the index. As a result, the fund is subject to the risk that the adviser’s investment management strategy, the implementation of which is subject to a number of constraints, may not produce the intended results. Because the fund utilizes a sampling approach it may not track the return of the index as well as it would if the fund purchased all of the securities in its benchmark index.

Tracking Error Risk.  As an index fund, the fund seeks to track the performance of its benchmark index, although it may not be successful in doing so. The divergence between the performance of the fund and its benchmark index, positive or negative, is called “tracking error.” Tracking error can be caused by many factors and it may be significant.

Derivatives Risk.  The fund’s use of derivative instruments involves risks different from, or possibly greater than, the risks associated with investing directly in securities and other traditional investments and could cause the fund to lose more than the principal amount invested. In addition, investments in derivatives may involve leverage, which means a small percentage of assets invested in derivatives can have a disproportionately larger impact on the fund.

Liquidity Risk.  A particular investment may be difficult to purchase or sell. The fund may be unable to sell illiquid securities at an advantageous time or price.

Securities Lending Risk.  Securities lending involves the risk of loss of rights in the collateral or delay in recovery of the collateral if the borrower fails to return the security loaned or becomes insolvent.

Concentration Risk.  To the extent that the fund’s or the index’s portfolio is concentrated in the securities of issuers in a particular market, industry, group of industries, sector or asset class, the fund may be adversely affected by the performance of those securities, may be subject to increased price volatility and may be more susceptible to adverse economic, market, political or regulatory occurrences affecting that market, industry, group of industries, sector or asset class.

Market Trading Risk.  Although fund shares are listed on national securities exchanges, there can be no assurance that an active trading market for fund shares will develop or be maintained. If an active market is not maintained, investors may find it difficult to buy or sell fund shares.

Shares of the Fund May Trade at Prices Other Than NAV.  Fund shares may be bought and sold in the secondary market at market prices. Although it is expected that the market price of the shares of the fund will approximate the fund’s net asset value (NAV), there may be times when the market price and the NAV vary significantly. You may pay more than NAV when you buy shares of the fund in the secondary market, and you may receive less than NAV when you sell those shares in the secondary market.

Lack of Governmental Insurance or Guarantee.  An investment in the fund is not a bank deposit and it is not insured or guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) or any other government agency.

For more information on the risks of investing in the fund please see the “Fund details” section in the prospectus.

Investment adviser

Charles Schwab Investment Management, Inc.

Portfolio managers

Agnes Hong, CFA, Managing Director and Head of Passive Equity Strategies, is responsible for the day-to-day co-management of the fund. She has managed the fund since 2009.

Ferian Juwono, CFA, Managing Director and Senior Portfolio Manager, is responsible for the day-to-day co-management of the fund. He has managed the fund since 2010.

Chuck Craig, CFA, Managing Director and Senior Portfolio Manager, is responsible for the day-to-day co-management of the fund. He has managed the fund since 2012.

Purchase and sale of fund shares

The fund issues and redeems shares at its NAV only in large blocks of shares, typically 50,000 shares or more (“Creation Units”). These transactions are usually in exchange for a basket of securities included in the index and an amount of cash. As a practical matter, only institutions or large investors purchase or redeem Creation Units. Except when aggregated in Creation Units, shares of the fund are not redeemable securities.

Individual shares of the fund trade on national securities exchanges and elsewhere during the trading day and can only be bought and sold at market prices throughout the trading day through a broker-dealer. Because fund shares trade at market prices rather than NAV, shares may trade at a price greater than NAV (premium) or less than NAV (discount).

Tax information

Dividends and capital gains distributions received from the fund will generally be taxable as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through an IRA, 401(k) or other tax-advantaged account.