A magnetic recording medium, the order of layers in which is the substrate, the soft underlayer, the seedlayer, the 1.sup.st RuCr.sub.x-containing interlayer, the 2.sup.nd RuCr.sub.x-containing interlayer and the magnetic recording layer with preferably a oxides or nitrides-containing magnetic layer comprising grains, is disclosed. High-chromium ruthenium-chromium alloy used as inter layers significantly enhances coercivity and SMNR preferably due to the improved lattice match between RuCr inter layers and CoPt-based magnetic recording layers, and the surface energy of RuCr layers contributes to the performance improvement with the high-chromium addition into Ru inter layers.