Take Me Home is the second studio album by British-Irish boy band One Direction, released on November 9, 2012, by Syco Music and Columbia Records. As a follow-up to One Direction's internationally successful debut album Up All Night (2011), Take Me Home was written in groups and has an average of just under five songwriters per track. Largely recorded and composed in Sweden during 2012, Savan Kotecha, Rami Yacoub and Carl Falk, who composed One Direction's hits, "What Makes You Beautiful" and "One Thing", spent six months in Stockholm developing songs for the album, and were able to shape melodies around the members' tones.

The album's songs are characterised by metronomic pop, vocal harmonies, hand claps, prominent electric guitar riffs, bright synthesizers, a homogeneous sound and message, and rotations of lead vocals. The members' voices are presented individually on the record, and its lyricism speaks of falling in love, unrequited love, commitment, jealousy and self-empowerment. Take Me Home garnered mostly positive reviews from music critics. There was praise for its quality of production, while criticism hinged on its generic, rushed nature.

Globally, the album topped the charts in more than 35 countries. According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), Take Me Home was the fourth-global-best-selling album of 2012, selling 4.4 million units. The album's number-one debut on the US Billboard 200 chart made One Direction the first group to bow atop the Billboard 200 with their first two albums since American girl group Danity Kane entered with Welcome to the Dollhouse in 2008 and their self-titled debut in 2006. One Direction also became the second act in 2012 to achieve two number-one albums within a 12-month period, and the first boy band in US chart history to land two number-one albums in a calendar year. Their debut album and Take Me Home were the third and fifth-best-selling albums of 2012 in the United States, respectively, making the band the first act to place two albums in the year-end top five in the Nielsen SoundScan era.

The album's lead single, "Live While We're Young", released on 28 September 2012, peaked inside the top ten in almost every country it charted in and recorded the highest one-week opening sales figure for a song by a non-U.S. artist. The subsequent singles, "Little Things" and "Kiss You", were less successful, although the former topped the UK Singles Chart. To promote the album, One Direction performed the album's songs on several televised programmes and a headlining sold-out concert at the Madison Square Garden. Furthermore, One Direction embarked on their second worldwide concert tour entitled the Take Me Home Tour in 2013.

In 2012, One Direction revealed that a follow-up release to their debut album, Up All Night (2011), was in development. "In the summer, we're going to get back and start a new record. We want to bring out a record nearly every year, every year and a half," Niall Horan said, revealing they were arranging "meetings and stuff with different writers and producers." In March 2012, McFly frontman Tom Fletcher confirmed that he would be writing a song for the album. In February 2012, One Direction expressed interest in working with Ed Sheeran, and in June 2012, Sheeran confirmed that they were in contact: "I'm going into the studio in August to produce the tracks for them. I won't feature on the tracks though".

In April 2012, The Independent reported that Simon Cowell, the group's manager, had challenged prominent songwriters to compete for space on One Direction's second album. Dee Demirbag, responsible for repertoire at BMG Rights Management, a music publisher, in Scandinavia, said: "Breaking a boy band in the U.S. is about as big as it gets in the music industry, so you can imagine the competition to get cuts on the next One Direction album is immense". In addition, the article reported that Syco Records was working on candidates with Max Martin and Kristian Lundin. By August 2012, it was confirmed that album would feature work from veterans such as Carl Falk, Rami Yacoub, Dr. Luke, Cirkut, and Shellback.

Take Me Home was written in groups and has an average of just under five songwriters per track. "The Swedish-style songwriting: melody first" was predominantly utilised, according to Time correspondent Douglas Wolk. Savan Kotecha, Yacoub, and Falk, who composed One Direction's hits, "What Makes You Beautiful" and "One Thing", spent six months in Stockholm, Sweden, developing songs for the album, and were able to shape melodies around their tones. Kotecha reflected: "We'll spend days, sometimes weeks, challenging the melody. The goal is to make it sound like anyone can do this, but it's actually very difficult". In addition, after viewing the international success of "What Makes You Beautiful", the trio conceptualised songs "that kids could play on guitar and cover on YouTube."

After extensive promotional appearances in support of their debut album, One Direction began recording the album in May 2012, in Stockholm, Sweden, at Kinglet Studios. In June 2012, the group continued recording the album in the United States, while touring on the final leg of their Up All Night Tour. Horan, in a June interview with MTV News, disclosed that the group were intending to spend their time in July and August "getting the album done." Besides sessions in Kinglet Studios, recording sessions and mixing for the album took place at Chalice Studios in Los Angeles, MixStar Studios in Virginia Beach, Wendy House Productions in London, and Sticky Studios in Surrey, England.