New ternary composites based on three dimensionally ordered macroporous (3DOM) SrTiO3 (CdS/Au/3DOM-SrTiO3) were prepared and used as photocatalysts in visible light (lambda >420 nm) photocatalytic water splitting for hydrogen evolution. Through optimizing the pore size of 3DOM-SrTiO3 materials and the loading amounts of Au and CdS, CdS/AuI3DOM-SrTiO3(300), templated by 300 nm sized poly(methyl methacrylate) colloids, was found to exhibit a remarkably enhanced photocatalytic hydrogen evolution rate (2.74 mmol/h g), which was 3.2 times as high as that of CdS/Au/C-SrTiO3 catalyst based on commercial SrTiO3. This notably enhanced photocatalytic performance was mainly attributed to the slow photon enhancement effect of 3DOM-SrTiO3(300) material, which significantly promoted the light harvesting efficiency of ternary composite for the slow photon region of 3DOM-SrTiO3(300) was well matched with the optical absorption band of photocatalyst. Further depositing Pt nanoparticles on CdS/Au/3DOM-SrTiO3(300) composite as a co-catalyst, an extraordinarily high hydrogen evolution rate (up to 5.46 mmol/g h) and apparent quantum efficiency (42.2% at 420 nm) were achieved because of the synergistic effect of efficient carrier separation, Au SPR effect, and slow photon effect. Furthermore, these ternary CdS/Au/3DOM-SrTiO3 composite photocatalysts were very stable and could be easily recycled four times in visible light photocatalytic water splitting experiments without any loss in activity. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.