By using the symmetric mountain pass theorem, we establish some new existence criteria to guarantee that the second-order Hamiltonian systems ü(t) − L(t)u(t) + ∇W(t,u(t)) = 0 have infinitely many homoclinic orbits, where t ∈ ℝ, u ∈ ℝN, L ∈ C(ℝ, ℝN × N) and W ∈ C1(ℝ × ℝN, ℝ) are not periodic in t. Our results generalize and improve some existing results in the literature by relaxing the conditions on the potential function W(t, x).