OBJECTIVES: Generic, preference-based Health-related Quality of Life (HRQoL) instruments are increasingly used in decision-making process of clinicians and policymakers. However, no such HRQoL instrument has been validated or used in Chronic Prostatitis (CP), in which a goal of patient management is to improve the HRQoL. We therefore aimed to assess and compare the psychometric properties of EuroQol (EQ-5D) and Short Form 6D (SF-6D) among CP patients in China. METHODS: Consenting CP patients were interviewed using EQ-5D and SF-6D. Convergent and discriminative construct validities were examined with five and two a priori hypotheses respectively. Sensitivity was compared using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves and relative efficiency (RE) statistics. Agreement between instruments was assessed with intra-class correlation coefficients (ICCs) and Bland-Altman plot, while factors affecting utility difference were explored with multiple liner regression models. RESULTS: In 268 CP patients (median age 32 years) who completed the interview, mean ± SD EQ-5D and SF-6D utility scores were comparable at 0.74 ± 0.13 and 0.75 ± 0.09 respectively. Five of the seven hypotheses for construct validity were fulfilled in both instruments. The areas under ROC all exceeded 0.5 (P<0.001), suggesting that the instruments are sensitive to detect clinically relevant differences in CP patients, with SF-6D having 9.7-19.9% higher efficiency at detecting difference in CP symptom severity. Despite no significant difference in paired comparisons of utility scores between the 2 instruments, lack of agreement was observed with low ICC (0.218-0.630) and Bland-Altman plot analysis. CP symptom severity significantly (P<0.05) influenced differences in utility scores between EQ-5D and SF-6D. CONCLUSIONS: EQ-5D and SF-6D are demonstrated to be valid and sensitive HRQoL measures in Chinese CP patients, with SF-6D showing better HRQoL dimension coverage, greater sensitivity and lower ceiling effect. Further research is needed to determine other psychometric properties, such as longitudinal response and reliability.