Patent ID: 7583472

Claim:
A thin film magnetic head comprising: a thin film coil for generating a magnetic flux; and a magnetic pole layer which extends rearward from a recording-medium-facing surface facing a recording medium traveling in a medium travel direction and emits the magnetic flux generated by the thin film coil toward the recording medium, wherein the magnetic pole layer includes: a uniform width portion having uniform width that specifies recording track width of the recording medium, extending from the recording-medium-facing surface, and including an exposed surface exposed on the recording-medium-facing surface; and a wide portion coupled to the rear end of the uniform width portion, extending with width larger than the uniform width, and including widened end surfaces along the increased width, and height H 2 of the widened end surface in the wide portion is smaller than height H 1 of the exposed surface in the uniform width portion (H 2 <H 1 ), wherein the wide portion includes wing portions positioned on both sides of the uniform width portion, and thickness T 2 of the wing portions is smaller than thickness T 1 of the uniform width portion at least on the side close to the widened end surfaces (T 2 <T 1 ).