(Small Company Growth Trust)

Investment Objective

To seek long-term growth of capital.

Fees and Expenses

This table describes the fees and expenses that you may pay if shares of the fund are held by separate accounts of certain John Hancock insurance companies that fund variable annuity and variable life insurance contracts. They are based on expenses incurred during the fund's most recent fiscal year expressed as a percentage of the fund's average net assets during the year. In subsequent periods, the fund's expense ratio may increase due to decreases in fund assets attributable to redemptions and declines in portfolio valuation. The fees and expenses do not reflect fees and expenses of any separate account that may use the fund as its underlying investment medium and would be higher if they did.

Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)

Annual Fund Operating Expenses (Small Company Growth Trust)	Series I		Series II		NAV
Management fee	1.00%	[1]	1.00%	[1]	1.00%
Distribution and service (12b-1) fees	0.05%	[1]	0.25%	[1]	none
Other Expenses	0.08%	[1]	0.08%	[1]	0.08%
Total annual fund operating expenses	1.13%	[1]	1.33%	[1]	1.08%

Examples. The examples are intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds. The examples assume that $10,000 is invested in the fund for the periods indicated and then all shares are redeemed at the end of those periods. The examples also assume that the investment has a 5% return each year and that the fund's operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions your costs would be:

Expense Example (Small Company Growth Trust) (USD $)	1 Year	3 Years	5 Years	10 Years
Series I	115	359	622	1,375
Series II	135	421	729	1,601
NAV	110	343	595	1,317

Portfolio Turnover

The fund pays transaction costs, such as commissions, when it buys and sells securities (or "turns over" its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the fund's performance. During its most recent fiscal year, the fund's portfolio turnover rate was 28% of the average value of its portfolio.

Principal Investment Strategies

Under normal market conditions, the fund invests at least 80% of its net assets (plus any borrowings for investment purposes) in securities of small-capitalization companies. The fund considers a company to be a small-capitalization company if it has a market capitalization, at the time of investment, no larger than the largest capitalized company included in the Russell 2000 Index during the most recent 11-month period (based on month-end data) plus the most recent data during the current month. As of February 28, 2013, the capitalizations of companies included in the Russell 2000 Index ranged from less than $1 million to $6.1 billion.

The fund will invest primarily in marketable equity securities, including convertible securities, but its investments may include other securities, such as synthetic and derivative instruments, including futures and options. Options and index futures may be used to equitize cash and for other liquidity purposes in special situations. Synthetic instruments are investments that have economic characteristics similar to the fund's direct investments and may include warrants, ETFs and American Depositary Receipts (ADRs). Synthetic and derivative instruments may have the effect of leveraging the fund's portfolio. The fund may also invest up to 20% of its net assets in equity securities of issuers that have market capitalizations, at the time of purchase, in other market capitalization ranges, and in investment-grade non-convertible debt securities, U.S. government securities and high-quality money market instruments. The fund may invest up to 25% of its total assets in foreign securities. Any percentage limitations with respect to assets of the fund are applied at the time of purchase. The fund may also invest significantly in the information technology sector.

In selecting investments, the subadvisor utilizes a disciplined portfolio construction process that constrains the fund's industry group weightings within a specific range versus the industry group weightings of the Russell 2000 Growth Index which the subadvisor believes represents the small cap growth asset class. The security selection process is based on a three-step process that includes fundamental, valuation and timeliness analysis.

• Fundamental analysis involves building a series of financial models, as well as conducting in-depth interviews with company management. The goal is to find high quality, fundamentally sound companies operating in an attractive industry.

• Valuation analysis focuses on identifying attractively valued securities given their growth potential over a one- to two-year horizon.

• Timeliness analysis is used to help identify the "timeliness" of a purchase. In this step, relative price strength, trading volume characteristics, and trend analysis are reviewed for signs of deterioration. If a stock shows signs of deterioration, it will not be considered as a candidate for the portfolio.

The subadvisor may consider selling a security if a change in industry or company fundamentals indicates a problem, the price target set at purchase is exceeded or a change in technical outlook indicates poor relative strength.

Principal Risks of Investing in the Fund

The fund is subject to risks, and you could lose money by investing in the fund. The principal risks of investing in the fund include:

Active management risk The subadvisor's investment strategy may fail to produce the intended result.

Credit and counterparty risk The issuer or guarantor of a fixed-income security, the counterparty to an over-the-counter derivatives contract or a borrower of a fund's securities may be unable or unwilling to make timely principal, interest or settlement payments, or otherwise honor its obligations. Funds that invest in fixed-income securities are subject to varying degrees of risk that the issuers of the securities will have their credit rating downgraded or will default, potentially reducing a fund's share price and income level.

Equity securities risk The value of a company's equity securities is subject to changes in the company's financial condition, and overall market and economic conditions.

Exchange-traded funds risk Owning an ETF generally reflects the risks of owning the underlying securities it is designed to track.

Fixed-income securities risk Fixed-income securities are affected by changes in interest rates and credit quality. A rise in interest rates typically causes bond prices to fall. The longer the average maturity of the bonds held by the fund, the more sensitive the fund is likely to be to interest-rate changes. There is the possibility that the issuer of the security will not repay all or a portion of the principal borrowed and will not make all interest payments.

Foreign securities risk As compared to U.S. companies, there may be less publicly available information relating to foreign companies. Foreign securities may be subject to foreign taxes. The value of foreign securities is subject to currency fluctuations and adverse political and economic developments.

Hedging, derivatives and other strategic transactions risk Hedging and other strategic transactions may increase the volatility of a fund and, if the transaction is not successful, could result in a significant loss to a fund. The use of derivative instruments could produce disproportionate gains or losses, more than the principal amount invested. Investing in derivative instruments involves risks different from, or possibly greater than, the risks associated with investing directly in securities and other traditional investments and, in a down market, could become harder to value or sell at a fair price. The following is a list of certain derivatives and other strategic transactions in which the fund may invest and the main risks associated with each of them:

Futures contracts Counterparty risk, liquidity risk (i.e., the inability to enter into closing transactions) and risk of disproportionate loss are the principal risks of engaging in transactions involving futures contracts.

Options Counterparty risk, liquidity risk (i.e., the inability to enter into closing transactions) and risk of disproportionate loss are the principal risks of engaging in transactions involving options. Counterparty risk does not apply to exchange-traded options.

Information technology risk The information technology sector can be significantly affected by rapid obsolescence of existing technology, short product cycles, falling prices and profits, competition from new market entrants, government regulation and general economic conditions.

Issuer risk An issuer of a security may perform poorly and, therefore, the value of its stocks and bonds may decline. An issuer of securities held by the fund could default or have its credit rating downgraded.

Liquidity risk Exposure exists when trading volume, lack of a market maker or legal restrictions impair the ability to sell particular securities or close derivative positions at an advantageous price.

Medium and smaller company risk The prices of medium and smaller company stocks can change more frequently and dramatically than those of large company stocks. For purposes of the fund's investment policies, the market capitalization of a company is based on its market capitalization at the time the fund purchases the company's securities. Market capitalizations of companies change over time.

Past Performance

The following information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the fund by showing changes in performance from year to year and by showing how average annual returns for specified periods compare with those of a broad measure of market performance. Unless all share classes shown in the table have the same inception date, performance shown for periods prior to the inception date of a class is the performance of the fund's oldest share class. This pre-inception performance, with respect to any other share class of the fund, has not been adjusted to reflect the 12b-1 fees of that class. As a result, the pre-inception performance shown for a share class other than the oldest share class may be higher or lower than it would be if adjusted to reflect the 12b-1 fees of the class. The performance information below does not reflect fees and expenses of any variable insurance contract which may use JHVIT as its underlying investment medium. If such fees and expenses had been reflected, performance would be lower. The past performance of the fund is not necessarily an indication of how the fund will perform in the future.

Calendar year total returns for Series NAV:

Best Quarter:     19.00% (Quarter ended 6/30/2009)

Worst Quarter:   -26.67% (Quarter ended 12/31/2008)

Average Annual Total Returns for period ended 12/31/2012

Average Annual Total Returns (Small Company Growth Trust)	1 Year	5 Years	Since Inception	Inception Date
NAV	18.32%	3.38%	6.54%	Oct. 24, 2005
Russell 2000 Growth Index	14.59%	3.49%	5.98%	Oct. 24, 2005

[1] For funds and classes that have not commenced operations or have an inception date of less than six months as of December 31, 2012, expenses are estimated.